


Horizon

by Lanerose



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Zack Lives, Characters Listed in Rough Order of Appearance Not Importance, Ensemble Cast, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-02-26 01:18:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13225167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lanerose/pseuds/Lanerose
Summary: Some things are better left forgotten.  Some things refuse to stay that way.Or, the AU where Zack survived the events of Last Order.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> “Living is strife and torment, disappointment and love and sacrifices, golden sunsets and black storms.” ~ Laurence Olivier

Zack struggled to open his eyes once more. Red lights flashed brilliantly in the darkened room, casting an eerie brown glow through his Mako filled eyes. He fought against the burning touch of the smooth green substance that urged him to lethargy, to close his eyes and struggle no more. He had to get out of here… had to go… had to…  
  
_Click._  
  
The sound echoed from the far side of the room, jerking Zack from the edge of sleeping once more to stare at the door. The bolt had been thrown open. Moments later, the knob twisted, and the door was cast ajar as a young lab attendant walked steadily into the room. The lights cast a hellish glow upon him. Zack watched in amazement as the dark-haired man began the process of draining the Mako from his tube. None of the staff had been brave enough to do so after what he had done to the attendant during his last escape attempt. Not that he blamed them… Given the chance, he’d gladly kill them all, if it meant his freedom.  
  
The Mako was gone now, and Zack took a deep breath for the first time in over six months.  
  
“I’ll lift the glass,” said the man, “if you’ll promise not to kill me.”  
  
“Well,” Zack replied, coughing as he narrowed his eyes at his guest, “the question is, why would you do that for me? Hojo wouldn’t stand for it unless it’s in his plans for me. Now, call me crazy, but I’m not overly fond of the idea of walking out that door only to get riddled full of bullets again so that he can test my healing abilities.”  
  
Dark eyes flashed sharply with emotion as the attendant quickly busied himself with unlocking the cabinet containing Zack’s gear. There was his sword, his beautiful sword. He stared at it unabashed, recalling all too clearly the comforting feel of its weight in his hand.  
  
“Hojo’s dead.” The dark-haired man replied distractedly as he fished for something in the back of the cabinet.  
  
“Of course he is.” Zack said patronizingly, wrinkling his face at the other’s back. “Clearly, President Shinra has at long last seen the light, and decided to forsake Hojo and his evil ways, to stop drawing Mako from the Planet and return to the days without electricity or trains, to give away all his belongings and join Wutai in worshipping their gods. Heck, I’ll bet he’s even trying to talk Cloud into going with –“  
  
“Don’t talk of that failure to me.” The man said, whirling around, hatred blazing from nearly obsidian orbs. Zack paused, and waited. His companion took a steadying breath, and Zack let him. His voice was low and angry as it continued, “If President Shinra saw any light at all, undoubtedly it was merely his brain’s last desperate attempt at saving its pathetic existence.”  
  
“I don’t understand.” Zack answered, shaking his head.  
  
“He’s dead, too.” The man’s back turned towards the captive once more as he grabbed the last of the SOLDIER’s gear and threw it atop the rest. He wandered down a nearby hall, studying a clip board he’d brought with him and grabbing several files from the shelves as he went. “Hojo, President Shinra, even that brat Rufus – they’re all dead. What does it matter, though – most of the Planet won’t be around that much longer anyway.”  
  
“Wait, hold on a second – what in Holy’s name are you talking about?” Zack leaned forward in his cage, craning his neck to watch the man as he wandered down the hall and selected a few more files. Without the Mako pressing in on him from all sides, filling his lungs, Zack could feel his strength steadily returning to him. He was grateful, then, that being trapped in Mako protected muscles from atrophy. A few more minutes and he’d be free of the glass regardless of whether he had help or not.  
  
“Your friend – ” the derision in the word was palpable – “he’s at the North Crater now.” The lab technician turned and looked at him again, studying him for a moment. “You’ll be fine getting out of here on your own in a few minutes, so I’m afraid you’ll have to begrudge me a head start. There are some things on this planet I’d like to enjoy before that psycho destroys them.”  
  
“Cloud?” Zack gasped, his heart jumping into his throat. The attendant shook his head, seeming not to hear Zack as he busied himself switching one file for another and mumbling under his breath. Zack paused, then shook his own head once, twice to clear it. “No… He’s the only one, but he wouldn’t – he couldn’t! I thought he was dead!”  
  
“Mako poisoning is surprisingly non-lethal. It just takes time to adjust to the excess running through your system. Surely you knew that, even if those idiots who caught you the first time didn’t.” Dark eyes glanced speculatively at Zack with a raised eyebrow before the man began ordering his files, comparing each to the list and checking things off.  
  
“But – the Turks! He couldn’t have…” A sour taste filled his mouth, and Zack shook his head and swallowed to clear it. “Even if he could have, he wouldn’t. He just wouldn’t do something like this!”  
  
“Just how many people do you think there are left running around from Dr. Hojo’s experiments who have skills like Sephiroth?” The technician shook his head with a bitter, ironic smile on his face. He snatched the files back off the desk, tapping them once to neaten them, and slid them under his arm.  
  
“Why should I believe you?” Zack challenged as the other man contemplated the wide bladed sword on the table before him. He grinned at the dark-haired man before him, the flashing lights no longer bothering his eyes. It wouldn’t be long until he could shatter the glass. He spread his hands wide and shrugged. “After all, it’s not like Shinra employs the most trustworthy people I’ve ever met.”  
  
“Believe what you want.” The man replied, turning and walking sharply back to the door. He paused then, framed in the entrance way with his hand poised on the door knob as eerie red light shone around him. “Either way, your  _friend_  is still crazy, and he’s still about to destroy us all. Your opinions don’t matter.”  
  
Zack beat his fist upon the glass to no avail as the door slammed shut behind the man. The distinctive click of the bolt sliding home sounded, guaranteeing the attendant’s safe departure from… wherever this was. With an exasperated sigh, he seated himself on the floor of the now Mako-free tube, light spasms running through his arms and legs as lethargy slowly fell away from them.  
  
It simply couldn’t be true. Cloud… had he even survived the incident six months ago? There was no way to be sure. The man had had a point, though – if Cloud still lived, Zack wouldn’t blame him if he had gone crazy. Sephiroth had, after all – and then had killed Cloud’s mother, and destroyed his town. Cloud had been forced to kill Sephiroth, and their time together in the lab had shown nothing reassuring from the blond as to how he was dealing with that, never mind everything that had come before, and then years of torture and experiments with Hojo…  
  
No, Zack supposed the technician’s story wasn’t that strange after all.  
  
It would be stranger if Cloud were sane.  
  
So, if Cloud lived, then he had gone insane and intended to destroy the Planet. Zack gathered his strength and threw a fist into the glass again. This time it shattered, splintering away and leaving his knuckles covered in blood. Zack shook away the stinging sensation as he rose to his feet and strode out of the glass tubing that had served as his home for the past five and a half years. He walked slowly over to the pile of his clothing and began to dress.  
  
Zack sighed as the smooth fabric brushed against his skin, a painless source of warmth protecting him from the chill of the lab. There was no telling if Cloud still lived. Hell, there wasn’t even any guarantee that he’d leave this building in once piece, though leaving him his sword had meant leaving him a huge advantage. He grabbed the broad weapon by the hilt, deciding against putting it at his back until he had departed the location. Cautiously, he strode forward and opened the door.  
  
Empty.  
  
The outer room was empty, save for a table and a bunch of crates, though a chair at a computer on the far side suggested that someone had at one point worked in this space. Zack stepped warily into the room, only slightly surprised when the door closed behind him and, as he turned to look at it, showed not a door at all, but a solid wall.  
  
“At least this place isn’t as creepy as the Shinra mansion in Nibelheim.” Zack said wryly, heading carefully for the stairs. He climbed silently up them, tensed against the imminent arrival of guards to recapture “Specimen Z” for Hojo. The stairs were solid, with a nice finish, and as he reached the head of them, Zack noticed there were paintings on the walls. He glanced around at the vaguely familiar décor, trying to place it.  
  
Slowly but steadily, sword still in his hand, Zack studied the passageway. After a critically appraising the doors dotted along the hallway, he shrugged. Lifting his weapon to a ready position, Zack charged down the hallway, around a corner to the right, another to the left, and through the last door into the outside world.  
  
_Ouch._  
  
Zack hissed softly, and nearly drew back into the building as the blazing sun beat down upon him. A warm breeze blew across his bare shoulders, grabbing his long hair and lifting it ever so slightly into the air. Raising a hand to his brow, Zack turned to study his surroundings.  
  
“Welcome to Costa del Sol!” proclaimed a large sign on the path on which he stood. Zack spun back to look at the building he had just exited.   _Figures that Hojo would put a secret lab in every Shinra vacation home._  He shook his head.   _What can I get for this lovely villa, complete with its own hidden experimentation for all your mad scientist – related practices?_  
  
Laughter floated to his ears from the direction in which he remembered the beach being. So did the sounds of drunken singing, undoubtedly floating out of the bar. A couple walked arm in arm under the bridge on which he stood, the girl batting her eyes shamelessly at the well-muscled man to whom she had attached herself. The normalcy of it all reassured Zack, and he sheathed his sword at last.  
  
The former SOLDIER First Class blinked as a large shadow passed over head. Costa del Sol never suffered from the problems of foul weather that seemed to haunt other cities, especially Midgar. Surprised, Zack turned to stare at the sky.  
  
Hanging low there was a massive rock, coated in the same ominous red that had been flashing in the laboratory. It shone steadily, though, which some how made it seem even more portentous. As if summoned, the giant object seemed to be coming steadily closer to the Planet.  
  
_I may not be an astrophysicist, but I seem to recall something about meteors causing the end of the world…_  The lab attendant, it seemed, had been telling the truth. Unbidden, a memory from the early days in the lab, when Cloud still had something resembling coherence to his name, dashed across his mind. He had known, they both had… Hojo hadn’t bothered to hide his intentions from them to turn Cloud into what Sephiroth had been … Hadn’t bothered to hide what that might mean…  
  
_I’m coming, Cloud._  Zack shook his head once more and took off to find transport north.   _After all, I promised – and no one stops SOLDIER First-Class Zack from keeping a promise._


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "There are some things you learn best in calm, and some in storm.” ~Willa Cather

“… and honestly, Zack, I cannot even begin to fathom why you have dragged me here with you.” The voice was calm, but with a hint of genuine bewilderment laced through it. Cloud lay back, listening to it from behind closed eyes. Zack… the name sounded familiar.  
  
“It’s called moral support!” retorted a different voice. Where the first had been cool but friendly, this one blazed like a fire – warm, passionate, and wild. He had been right, Cloud decided, when he thought it sounded better when it wasn’t angry.  _Angry? When have I heard it angry?_  
  
“Besides,” the voice continued, “you’re good at stopping me when I’m about to really put my foot in it, and that’s something I’m going to need, and you would have met him sooner or later anyway, so it’s just as well-“  
  
“I see.” The calmer voice again, amusement laced through it as it breezed through the air. Cloud snuggled deeper into the covers, feeling the soft pillow beneath his head.   _Covers? Soft pillow? We don’t have things like that in the barracks… Where on the Planet could I be?_  Cloud thought for a moment about trying to figure it out before letting the drowsy lethargy block such thoughts.  
  
For a long moment, quiet reigned supreme. Then…  
  
“Well?” The cooler voice, and Cloud could picture the expression that would go with the word even if he still hadn’t managed to put a face to sound, could see what was going through the man’s mind.  
  
“Wha-? Oh, yeah, yeah, just trying to figure out how best to do this.” The fire voice, but muted somehow, drawn to a much more controlled blaze. Then it was back to a roaring blaze as it continued, “Well, no time like the present, right?”  
  
A door swung open then, somewhere nearby, and Cloud debated opening his eyes, the thoughts of doing so sliding through his pleasantly hazy mind as he decided to ignore them. Footsteps approached, one set stopping farther away and the other coming closer. A clanking sound, and then pages being flipped as something squeaked across the floor to his right.  
  
“Zack.” The first voice, cool and gentle, but closer now. Cloud smiled hazily at it. “They’ve got him on a combination of diazepam and morphine – you should probably wait until he’s coherent again before you try to tell him whatever it is you came here to say.”  
  
“Hmm… yeah, I guess you’re right.” Something callused and cool brushed the hair that had been tickling his nose away before coming to rest on his forehead.   _A hand maybe? I don’t think a washcloth feels like that..._  He sighed contentedly, surprised by how pleasant it felt. It lingered there soothingly. All was still for a moment.  
  
“We should probably let him rest.” The calmer voice, sounding vaguely expectant. He heard the clanking sound again, and the space where a response should have gone, only it dragged on in a way that felt too long. Still, Cloud couldn’t quite bring himself to care particularly much – not while that nice cool thing remained.  
  
“This is all my fault.”   _Whose voice was that?_  It had sounded like the fire one, but the quality of it had changed so much that he couldn’t be sure.   _It sounds… sad, almost… I wonder who it is? They shouldn’t be sad…_  For the first time that day, he felt compelled to open his eyes.  
  
“Yes, it is.” Quiet, almost reluctant. Cloud struggled against the million ton weights that weighed his eyelids down.   _Wonder what he looks like... He…? Yeah, he… Maybe tall? Hmmm…_  For all that he gave a valiant struggle, the weights remained as he heard an exasperated sigh.  
  
“Listen,” said the fire voice, burning with just the tiniest sparkle of mischief, “I know you’re new to this whole moral support thing, so I’ll let that one slide. In the future, though, here’s what you do when someone asks you a question like that: you tell them that they couldn’t have known, or something nice and comforting like that.”  
  
“…so you’re telling me to lie to you, or to others, for that matter?”  
  
“No, that’s not what I meant!” Seemed like the burning voice hadn’t caught the sparkle of amusement in the other one.   _I wonder how… it seems so obvious to me…_  “Geez… I just meant… ah, screw it, I’ll explain it some other time.”  
  
“As you will.”   _Satisfaction. That was definitely satisfaction. That he distracted the warmer voice…?_  Cloud concentrated twice as hard, growing steadily more curious as to what was on the other side of the dark veils obscuring his sight.  
  
The cool hand brushed his forehead again, and it occurred to Cloud to be confused as to how someone who sounded so warm could be so chilly to the touch. At least, he thought it was the warmer voice touching him.   _If I could just get my eyes open, I would know!_  Still, they remained shut.  
  
“We should let him rest, shouldn’t we?” Reluctance in the warm voice. The hand ran gently through his hair before the sound of scraping was heard and it pulled away.   _No, don’t… don’t stop… don’t leave…_  But then there were footsteps, heading away from him.  
  
“Sleep well, kid.” The warm voice again, but further away then it had been. Cloud forced his eyes to open just in time to catch a glimpse of something long and silvery before the door shut, leaving him once again alone in the room.  
  
_Not… worth… it…_  Cloud let his eyes close once more, and then things seemed for a long time simply to drift…  
  
“Cloud.” A voice calling, familiar and feminine. Someone’s hand on his shoulder, shaking him.   _Where’d they go? Where’s my pillow, this thing feels lumpier…_  Cloud shook his head as the arm continued to try to force him awake.  
  
“Cloud! Wake up!” More insistent that time.   _It’s cold..._  His blanket seemed to be missing, too. He went to roll over, and hopefully to find a source of heat, but the hand upon his shoulder staunchly refused to let him. “It’s time to go! Wake up, Cloud! We need to go stop Sephiroth!”  
  
_Sephiroth?_  
  
Cloud’s eyes shot open, the weights that had been holding them shut suddenly gone. Above him, the red tint of the sky announced the approaching dawn. Beside him, a girl with long dark hair released his shoulder and rose to her feet.   _Tifa…_ Cloud shook his head once before sitting up.  
  
“Finally.” Tifa said, watching as Cloud slowly stood. “I thought something had happened to you for a moment there. C’mon, the others are waiting for us!”  
  
“Yeah, all right.” He replied.   _No wonder I thought it was cold…_  The Northern Crater, covered in snow, felt every bit as chilly now that he had woken as it had when he was half asleep. Cloud grabbed his satchel of supplies from the ground, where it had been doubling as his pillow, and tied it once more around his waist. The vision of his dream crossed his mind all the while.  
  
_Was that… a memory? One of…_ my _memories?_  It didn’t seem impossible. His waking mind recalled all too clearly that one of the voices had been speaking with someone named Zack, and while Zack might have known another Zack, it didn’t make nearly as much sense as believing that this particular memory had been one of his own.  
  
_Sephiroth… that other voice belonged to Sephiroth, it must have! Did I… know Sephiroth? Zack… Zack knew Sephiroth, but did I?_  Hundreds of potential implications dashed their way across Cloud’s mind as he squinted into the morning sun, a view distorted by the hazily ominous glow of Meteor approaching. I…    
  
Cloud reached for the memories of his time in Shinra and not for the first time met only with a blank empty space and a steadily growing sense of frustration.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Travel by boat had never really been Zack’s favourite. Boats rocked. They generally reeked. They meant being trapped in one place for a long period of time. Worse, his previous experience with boats had shown that not only were you trapped in one place, you were trapped with one group of people, generally at least one of whom you absolutely couldn’t stand; for instance, Scarlet, Heidigger, Rufus – pretty much all of the Shinra higher ups, actually.  
  
Most of all, though, boats were just  _so damn  **SLOW!**_  
  
Realistically, Zack had been lucky to find anyone willing to take him to the Northern Crater. With Meteor fast approaching, most people had decided to live it up for what little time remained. It had been just Zack’s luck that the couple who ran the air show had decided to spend their time in Mideel, taking the only airplane in the area with them. Bike, motorcycle, hell even just running – he’d considered them all, and nothing would get him to the Crater fast enough. Just as Zack had been debating how fast he’d have to swim to get there in time, his current host had approached him.  
  
“Look,” she’d said at the end of a tense and somewhat suspicious conversation, Zack still expecting Shinra to show up for him any minute, “if you don’t come with me, you’ll never get there in time, and then we’re  _all_  screwed. That doesn’t work out so hot for me, so would you just come with me already?”  
  
Logic like that was hard to argue with, and so Zack found himself feeling unendingly grateful that he’d never been prone to motion sickness.  
  
_Cloud…_  
  
Zack leaned back on the deck, staring at the sky above him as his friend’s namesakes floated above him, the approaching Meteor casting an ominous glow upon them.   _Is Cloud like that now? Something pure, twisted into something gruesome and threatening?_  Not for the first time, he cursed Hojo and the man’s demented sense of what was appropriate treatment of other living beings.  
  
He remembered with terrible clarity what it had been like in the lab. Hojo had wanted Zack for experiments, wanted him specifically. He’d never have gone to Nibelheim, never have  _seen_  Cloud if it hadn’t been for Zack.  
  
_“You know, don’t you, Specimen Z, why it is that I’m experimenting on your friend and not on you?”_  
  
The words ghosted across his mind, and Zack shut his eyes to block out the images they created.  
  
_“It’s so simple, Z.”_    
  
The dark haired man reached up to adjust his glasses before grinning malevolently at him. Zack stared back, unable to move from his spot, floating in the midst of the Mako. He felt like he should be choking, but he couldn’t breathe to choke, Mako filtering in and out of his cells to keep him alive rather than air through his lungs. He wanted to reply, to snarl that it was as simple as Hojo’s own death would be when he got the chance, but could not move to do so.  
  
“You’d be just as good a specimen, you know.” He smiled sinisterly, and Zack changed his mind. Hojo’s death would be  _slow_  if he got any say in it. “In a way, I suppose I should say you  _are_  just as good a specimen.”  
  
“Yes,” Hojo continued, wandering around the tube in a way that left Zack feeling completely vulnerable. For a split second, gratitude flashed across his mind at the Mako, which made his small shudder invisible by stilling the motion. “Humans are such interesting creatures. The way you respond to his pain… it’s almost more interesting than the experiments I’ve done on him so far.”  
  
Hojo turned his back on him, and grabbed a stack of files from the desk. He shuffled them into a neat pile before wandering slowly down the hall.   _Cloud… What was he doing to Cloud now…?_  The vacant tube of Mako beside Zack stared at him mockingly as the doctor stuck the files into the shelves on the wall and came back towards him. The door opened, and a pair of guards entered and took up positions at either side of it.  
  
“Have those imbeciles managed to follow my instructions?” Hojo asked. Zack’s sense of apprehension grew.  
  
“Sir, yes sir. Jenova has made contact with Specimen C,” replied one of the guards. Hojo looked delighted, a grin that could not entirely be called pleasant lighting his face. Smiling, he flipped a switch,  _the_  switch, and the Mako began to drain from the tubes.    
  
_Jenova_  made contact  _with Cloud? What on the Planet is that supposed to mean? At least it’s over for now, at least Cloud’s probably still alive… They wouldn’t bring him back in here to stuff in a Mako tube if he wasn’t, would they? Hojo isn’t that twisted – well, wait no,_ Hojo _is that twisted but –_  
  
All thoughts were abruptly cut off as his blond friend was pulled back into the room.  
  
Zack had seen Cloud look pretty bad before. Weeks, months – however long they’d been here, he really couldn’t be certain – but it had certainly been enough time for him to get a sense of how Cloud usually looked when he came back from “visiting” with Hojo. It had been bad. Most of the time, the blond would stumble in, or be half-dragged by the guards  _almost like the times when he’d been drunk and I was stumbling with him or dragging him but so different and so very wrong_  and pushed back into the tube. More than one occasion had seen him being carried back, conscious but obviously in too much pain to move. Zack had seen Cloud beaten, bruised, at various stages of the healing process, ashamed, embarrassed to his ears, furious with him beyond the telling, even unconscious, but none of that could remove the truth of the situation.  
  
This was worse.  
  
_His eyes are empty._  Cloud’s body hung limply between the two guards, a parody of perfect health save for the terrible vacancy in the glowing orbs that were his eyes. Horror spread across Zack’s face, and he hated himself for granting Hojo the satisfaction, but he could no more have stopped the reaction than he could have grown wings and flown away. The guards dragged Cloud closer to the tubes, and Zack reached for him without thinking.  
  
_What? The glass…?_  
  
Zack stumbled forward when his hand met no resistance, moving quickly towards Cloud. He threw his arms around the blond, pulling the shorter man protectively into his own grasp. Zack’s own strength, so recently sapped by the Mako, had not yet returned, though. They tumbled gracelessly to the floor, landing with a sharp thud that resounded in the quiet lab.  _Should have expected it, it’s always the same, never strong enough right away, knew it, knew it, stupid._  Lying on the floor, his strength slowly gathering, Zack reached for Cloud again, grabbing the blond by the chin and forcing his face towards him. Sightless eyes stared at him without seeing, fixated on a point in the distance which Zack didn’t dare to contemplate.  
  
“Come on, Chocobo Head, snap out of it.” Zack said, shaking his friend by the shoulders. Cloud’s head rolled limply in response, tilting backwards and forwards, following the movement of his shoulders.   _Where are you, Cloud? What did Hojo do, what can I –_ what _did he_ do _?_  The sound of a pen scratching across a page echoed in Zack’s ears as the blond before him remained silent.  
  
“Interesting, Z, very interesting.”   _Shut up, asshole._  Zack ignored the dark haired man behind him in favour of positioning Cloud so that he could ruffle his hair like he always did, attempting to draw one more disgruntled squawk from the blond at how undignified it was.  
  
Hojo circled them slowly, all the while making notes on his chart, and Zack worked all the harder both to ignore him and to keep their faces angled away.   _Son of a bitch – Don’t know what you did to him, not sure I want to know, gonna kill you, gonna rip your throat out – Leave us alone, won’t give you the satisfaction, leave us alone, leave us alone!_  The ex-SOLDIER’s hand ran slowly through his friend’s hair now, stroking it in a soothing gesture like his mother used to do for him.   _Kid, kid, what am I going to do with you?_  
  
“Intriguing. You realize he won’t respond to you, but you keep attempting to get his attention.” Hojo’s voice grated ever more closely on Zack’s nerves, but he had become all too aware of their reality – of the guns pointed straight at them both, ready to destroy them in an instant if they moved too far.  
  
_Bastard. BASTARD! Get you one of these days, absolutely destroy you, you and your henchmen._  Carefully, Zack forced his hands to remain steady, his body almost calm in appearance. Hojo wanted him tense, wanted him upset.   _Wouldn’t do to satisfy him, would it, kid? Kid, you’re such a mess…_  
  
“Release him, Z.” Zack glanced up then, saw the complete detachment on Hojo’s face.   _Bastard._  Guns pointed at him, and Zack knew from experience that they would not hesitate to shoot him. After all, Hojo had long since found ways to patch him up from just about anything they could do to him. Zack released his friend’s body, refusing to betray by gesture or motion the reluctance with which it was done.  
  
Hojo turned, and motioned towards the guards. “Take them to the cell.”  
  
_Cell…?_  
  
“Don’t worry, Z, nothing too unpleasant, I assure you.” Hojo said with a sickening smile. The two guards who had been dragging Cloud earlier grabbed him again, as the others focused their weapons on Zack. “C is too weak to handle anything more, and putting him in contact with substantial amounts of Mako so soon after connecting to Jenova could result in setbacks. Since it’s only fair for you to have the same accommodations, you’ll be sharing the alternative space with him.”  
  
_Liar. If you treated us equally, I’d be lying there next to him._  
  
“Whatever you say, professor.” Zack replied, innocuously highlighting the word professor in a way that satisfied his envenomed belief that Hojo still envied Gast the title and acclaim the other scientist had earned. He shrugged in a forcedly casual way and allowed himself to be led.  
  
The trip to the cell had been short – it had, in fact, been right down the hall, hidden carefully behind a rotating bookcase. Zack walked into the dark area, his own Mako bright eyes glowing and adjusting to the light. As they did so, he saw clearly for the first time that Cloud’s also glowed, his in the almost too-bright way that Sephiroth’s eyes once had.  
  
“Sleep well.” Hojo said, and the door swung shut behind him. Zack allowed the forced mockery of cheer he’d sustained in front of the man to drop, glaring unabashedly at the door. He sprinted across the room to where the guards had left Cloud, grabbing him by the shoulders and holding him upright.  
  
“Cloud, you all right, buddy?” he asked, his voice tighter and slightly more tense than he had meant it to be,  _but what does that matter, with Hojo far away?_  “Come on, buddy, look at me for a second here. I need you to focus, okay?”  
  
Cloud’s head lolled limply, and Zack realized in an instant that his desperate hopes that Cloud had been faking something to catch a break from Hojo would not be fulfilled. He steadied the blond against the far wall, crouching beside him, and lifted his chin gently. His younger friend had clearly been pumped full of more Mako than was healthy. The Mako poisoning, though, was nothing new. Cloud had been pretty out of it since they’d gotten here, and in some respects Zack was grateful for that. Oblivion hurt less than awareness.  
  
“All right, let’s try this.” Zack said when the vacant eyes began to become too much for him. “Blink, Cloud. Just close your eyes for a second so that I know you’re still there. We made a deal, and damned if I’m not gonna hold you to it, so let me know you’re with me, okay?”  
  
The seconds stretched hideously long, and then…  
  
_Blink._  
  
“Great work there, Chocobo Head.” Zack said, hiding a sigh of relief by releasing Cloud’s chin and stretching. “All right. I guess Hojo really did a number on you this time, so I’ll tell you a story while you come back from wherever it is you’ve gone. Did I ever tell you about the first time Seph and I went on a mission together?”  
  
Time blurred, and Zack found suddenly that he had no idea what he’d been talking about any more, that his throat hurt and his voice was hoarse. His shoulder was fast approaching numb from the weight of Cloud’s head upon it, the arm wrapped around the blond’s shoulders growing stiff and the other nearing exhaustion from his wild gesticulation. It was worth it, though, when Cloud’s head moved along his shoulder of its owner’s own accord.  
  
“Zack.”   _Definitely worth it._  Zack’s smile felt brighter, even to himself, when the blond spoke as he paused to take a breath. Grinning, he turned to face the younger man.  
  
“What’s on your mind, Chocobo Head?” He replied.  
  
“ _Zaa-ack._ ” The dark haired man burst into laughter at the twist of annoyance in the blond man’s voice, his fears of the blond’s potentially prolonged catatonia assuaged for the moment. Cloud seemed to be having slight problems catching his breath, almost coughing when he spoke his friend’s name before unsteadily gathering more air.  
  
“All right, all right, I’m just teasing you.” Zack said, turning so that he was once more crouched in front of Cloud. It was easier to see the blond that way, easier to look at him now that his eyes had regained a bit of their spark. He smiled, and waited patiently.  
  
“Zack… if I… if I…” Cloud paused, seemingly unsure of the words. He took a slow deep breath, and continued, “if I… like Sephiroth, if I… you have –“  
  
“No!” The dark haired man cut his friend off vehemently and stood, stalking across the small space like an aggrieved cat. He paced the length of the room before whirling on the blond. “You’re not going to ask me that, Cloud. You’re not!”  
  
“Zack-“  
  
“NO!” He shook his head, raking a hand through long dark hair. “You know there was a reason he asked that of us, but there’s no reason for you to ask me to do the same for you. None! It won’t happen!”  
  
“Then promise…” The voice was soft, and Zack found his own eyes drawn by an irresistible force towards the pair of glowing light blue ones that stared straight at him, alert, awake, and  _alive_. He tried to turn away, but couldn’t move his head. “Promise…”  
  
Zack felt tempted for a moment, seriously tempted, to cut the blond off again. If he promised it wouldn’t happen, that he wouldn’t let it happen, maybe that would be enough. Cloud was weak now, wouldn’t have the energy to protest.   _But I don’t know if I can keep that promise…_  The thought staggered him, and Zack resisted the urge to look away.  
  
“Kill me…” Cloud said, too quietly, his eyes bright and aware. “If I… like Sephiroth… promise… kill me.”  
  
“Cloud…”  
  
_“Promise!”_  
  
The unexpected feel of a hand on his shoulder jolted Zack sharply from his reminiscence, and he began to reach for a weapon before realizing that not only was he not wearing it, but he actually had no need for it.  
  
“You all right?” The owner of the boat asked, eyeing him nervously.  
  
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” Zack replied, ignoring the blood singing in his veins, pounding sharply in his ears. “No worries. What’s up?”  
  
“Just thought you’d want to know that we’re getting close.” She pointed to the opposite side of the ship, where Zack could now clearly see the outline of the Northern Continent. “Shouldn’t be more than a day or so now.”  
  
“Great.” Zack replied, flashing her a smile as he took a deep breath and settled back against the deck. “Thanks.”  
  
She nodded back, and walked away.   _Won’t be long now._  Zack closed his eyes and soaked up the still warm sunlight.   _Don’t worry, Cloud.  
  
I promise._  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Midgar lay in shambles. The city had been all but destroyed by the Weapon’s attack, especially after the Plate had fallen. Some sections of the city had been completely crushed, while others had managed to survive with only some damage. The people of the city had, for the most part, been spared. Early sightings of Weapon’s approach had driven most of them away long before it had actually arrived, avoiding a greater loss of life than would have occurred. Even now, they had begun returning, picking up their lives from where they had left off. As it was, only the diehards who refused to leave had actually met their fate that day.  
  
_Stubbornness was never one of Rufus’s more attractive traits._  
  
Turks had cursed the height of the Shinra building for ages. The only way to have a building that tall without it being a complete fire hazard involved more staircases than could feasibly be patrolled, and cameras were notoriously easy to circumvent. It had been seen as a security risk, as a likely cause of assassination attempts, and had increased paranoia for years.  
  
Now, though, it was the only reason the last Shinra might still be alive,  _and isn’t there something entirely ironic about that – a security nightmare keeping a Shinra alive._  
  
When the Plate had fallen, it had tilted. The top of Shinra tower had started to fall back towards Kalm, while the Plate supports on the ocean side of the tower collapsed under Weapon’s attack. The downward shift of the ocean side had lifted the Kalm side of the Plate, bringing it up quickly to meet Shinra tower. The Plate had been falling by the time it hit the tower, but the important part was the slanted angle at which it had hit, decreasing the overall velocity of the tower’s fall by providing an upward force that, however temporarily, slowed the effects of gravity. The executive suite, farthest from the pivot point that was the base of the tower, had received the most benefit from the impact. Moreover, the tower’s height had contributed to the potential salvation of its executive by allowing the lower floors to absorb most of the crumbling force even as the Kalm side edge of the Plate steadied the building from complete collapse.  
  
Janice’s report from the helicopter confirmed that the executive suite still seemed somewhat intact.  
  
“It looks like it landed on top of the north part of sector five,” she said, her voice fading a bit because of the poor reception that the PHS was unsurprisingly producing. “One side of it is smashed in, but the other side looks pretty unscathed. There’s definitely still a chance that he’s alive. You need to - ”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, we got it.” Reno replied lackadaisically, running a hand through his hair. “We got it covered, right, Rude?”  
  
The bald man stared at him from behind his dark sunglasses, saying nothing, and Reno shrugged. Elena stood beside him, anxiety written across her face.  
  
“We got it.” Reno repeated.  
  
“All right, then we’ll leave it to you!” Janice answered. In the background, he could hear the whirring blades of the chopper for a brief moment before the sound abruptly cut off as she hung up. Reno clicked off his PHS and put it away, glancing idly at the large number 5 painted on the wall behind him.  
  
“Seems the president is just a little north of here.” He commented casually to his companions.   _Rufus, you asshole, if you’re dead, I’ll find a way to bring you back so I can kill you myself._  Reno hoisted his nightstick to his shoulder and turned to face them. “Let’s go.”  
  
“Do they know if he’s alive?” Elena asked, her face drained of color, and Reno carefully restrained himself from cursing all the generations of the Shinra line. He could make it through the first ten without too many problems, but after that the insults had to get creative.   _Man, she’s still a kid… what a mess this all is._  
  
“He’s Shinra – they’re kinda like cockroaches, you know – pretty hard to kill.”   _Unless you’ve got a good boot heel – but she doesn’t need to know that._  Rude nodded affirmatively.  
  
“Hey, don’t speak about the president that way!” Elena protested, an angry flush rushing into her face.   _She’s angry, and that’s good. At least if she’s angry, she’ll forget to worry._  Reno didn’t bother replying as he turned and started walking. “Just because he’s not here doesn’t mean that you should say things like that about our boss!”  
  
The blonde darted around him, glaring as she walked backwards hastily in order not to slow the pace of their mission. Her blue eyes were lit with fierce determination. Rude walked easily to his side, his long legs quickly making up the distance that Elena had had to fight to obtain, then easing back to the same pace that Reno himself was setting.  
  
“You talk too much, Elena.” Reno replied with a shake of his head.  
  
“I do not!” Elena said, glancing behind her to make sure that the path was clear before fixing him with a heated stare. “And that reminds me! Was it really all right to just let Avalanche go?”    
  
_Cloud Strife._    
  
“You defied a direct order while we were on company time! Tseng is going to have a field day when he finds out, never mind what the president will say!” She didn’t stop there, but that was right about the time that Reno stopped listening to her and concentrated on walking just fast enough that she wouldn’t think he was slowing down for her but also wouldn’t trip herself.  
  
The shadows created by the noontime sun had a reddish cast that day.   _How appropriate – Midgar looking like the hell that it is._  Meteor was steadily approaching. Soon, nothing would be able to stop it. It might even have already been too late.  
  
_Strife, you gotta stop that son of a bitch Sephiroth if any of us are ever gonna make it through this. You gotta –_  
  
Reno’s attention jolted back to reality as his head jolted sharply to one side, the sunglasses he had been wearing breaking at the ear piece.  
  
“Damn it, Elena, what was that for?” He snarled, shaking his head as he pulled the glasses off and eyed them speculatively. They had been a decent pair, one of the few he had found that looked cool without hiding his tattoos. After regarding them for a moment, he tossed them into a nearby pile of the rubbish that simply sat upon the streets these days.  
  
_Damn. Gonna be a bitch to find a new pair like those, isn’t it?_  
  
“You’re not even  _pretending_  to listen, Reno!” She railed at him, crossing her arms across her chest and turning her back upon him. “This is serious, here. You could be executed for pulling a stunt like that.”  
  
“Look, Elena – just chill, all right?” Reno eyed the ominous horizon as he kept heading north. He continued in a careless voice as he closed his eyes, sauntering after her. “Either Strife stops Sephiroth and Meteor doesn’t fall, or he doesn’t and we all die. Either way I’m good – not gonna kill me for letting the man save the world, are they? Doesn’t much matter the other way, right, Ru– oof! What the hell, Elena?”  
  
Elena had frozen in her tracks, which had naturally caused Reno to walk straight into her. He ran a hand lazily through his hair as he looked up to see what had her startled, and sure enough, there it was.  
  
_Rufus._  
  
The executive suite looked much different when viewed at eye height through the windows then it ever had while standing inside it or circling it in a helicopter. Not that the windows themselves were there – the glass was gone. There, in the middle of a heap of rubble, sticking up slightly, the red light fell upon white fabric that had not yet faded to the gray around it.  
  
“Let’s go!” Rude shouted, dashing towards the spot, and Reno said a quick prayer to the gods he didn’t believe in as he ran after his partner, Elena close behind.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Cid carefully shielded his cigarette from the wind as he tried once more to light it. If the world ended today, he sure didn’t want to miss his last chance at a smoke.  
  
“Damn wind!” He cursed violently as a particularly strong gust blew out the tiny flame before he could bring it into contact with his cigarette. Sighing, he reached in his pocket for the matchbook and went to strike another match. It lit for a moment, flickered oddly and would have gone out had not the window suddenly ceased to blow. Surprised, Cid looked around.  
  
“It would have gone out again.” The raven haired man whose long red cloak was raised in front of Cid as a wind shield said disinterestedly. Grinning, Cid nodded his appreciation and hurriedly lit his cigarette. Vincent nodded, dropped his cloak, and turned away.   _Man, that guy is weird._  Blissfully, Cid drew in a breath.  
  
_There really is nothing quite like a cigarette when a man is about to die._  
  
He took a long drag off the cigarette, turning to look at the rest of this crazy group he’d somehow joined. The big cat had curled up in the one corner that didn’t seem to be getting much wind. The ninja girl sat beside him, petting him until he looked ready to bite her. Just as the kitty’s patience started to wear thin, she withdrew her hand and laughed at him. Mr. Vampire and Gun Arm stared unblinkingly at each other across the fire, though neither seemed to really be all there.   _Not that either of them is usually all there, but that’s not the point…_  The—well, Cid didn’t really know what to call it—robot thing merely sat there, and Cid found himself almost wistfully wishing the other two members of their party would get up and join them so they could get this over with already. Slowly, his attention turned to the large cavern to his right.  
  
_Sephiroth is in there._  The knowledge of it made him shiver, glad of the cold as an excuse to cover should anyone ask.   _If we go down, we’ll go down fighting. Maybe we’ll even take him down with us… Eight on one certainly puts the odds in our favour, even if it is Sephiroth._  Tifa ran over the crest of the hill, Cloud following behind, and Cid shook away the thoughts.  _We’re strong enough… We’ll manage, somehow, to be tough enough for this… though it kill us all, the Planet will survive._    
  
“This is the center of the Planet…?” Cloud’s soft tenor said as he approached the entrance. His eyes glowed in an odd way that couldn’t have just been the Mako in them, and suddenly Cid found himself thinking about how much older he himself was than the rest of them.  
  
“We finally made it here.” Nanaki replied, stretching and rising to his… paws. He shook the snow loose from his fur and joined the growing circle around the fire. Cid took one final drag from his cigarette and tried to ignore the growing unease he felt.  
  
“Let’s just get this over with!” He interjected, dropping the remains of his smoke to the ground and grinding it under his heel.   _Planet’ll forgive me if we save it, and if we don’t it won’t matter anyway._    
  
Vincent snorted, and Cid turned to glare at him. He stopped, though, when something caught his eye.   _Is he…?_  The corners of the man’s mouth had turned upward slightly, and Cid couldn’t help but think that for the first time since they’d met the man he might actually be smiling.  
  
“Being with you all is not so bad,” he said, and Cid found himself oddly pleased to be in the man’s good regard.   _Then again, at the end of the world, what really matters?_  He turned sharply away.  
  
“Awright, this is the last dance!” Cid didn’t even need to look to know that gun arm boy was doing his dance, psyching himself up for what was to come.   _Does he not get it? Do any of them really understand?_  
  
“This is it!” Her voice was heartbreakingly sweet, young and still fairly innocent.  
  
“Well…” So the robot was active again. “Shall we get going?”  
  
Cid turned back to face the group. Slowly, their leader faced each one of them in turn, waiting until they nodded in expression of their own readiness before tipping his own head sharply.  
  
“All right everyone, let’s mosey!”   _Innocent… far too innocent, and far too young…_  
  
“Damn! Again!” Cid swore, the others all turning to look at him. “Stop sayin’ it like a wimp! Can’t you say ‘Move out!’ or somethin’?”  
  
Cloud raised a hand to scratch the back of his head, the vaguely childish gesture of embarrassment drilling home just who had been chosen to save the world. He was grateful when the boy nodded, and stood straighter. Suddenly, the man Cid had chosen to follow looked much older than his mere 21 years would suggest, and Cid was thankful for it.  
  
“Move out!” he said, complete with dramatic gesture as he spun to face the cavern once more, his sword glinting in the morning light as he headed into the darkness. Crossing his fingers and looking for what might be the final time at the light of the sun, Cid grabbed his lance and followed.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "The flesh endures the storms of the present alone; the mind, those of the past and the future as well as the present.” ~Thomas Hobbes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FYI, none of the Turks in Before Crisis had names at the time that I wrote this (I think some of them got names later???) so I made them all up. ^^;;; And then I got attached to the names I made up. ^^;;;; So even if they do have real names, they are really stuck with whatever I decided to call them for purposes of this fic.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!” Rude heard Elena chanting under her breath as they ran around the pile of rubble before them. The piece of white cloth that had first caught her attention grew larger as they approached, and Rude could tell that it was attached to a coat that could only have been Rufus’s. They rounded the pile at top speed.  
  
“Rufus!” Rude shouted as the president came clearly into sight, and he could hear his partners’ echoing shouts beside him. For a moment, they stood frozen together.    
  
_He looks awful…_  
  
Rufus lay facedown upon the ground, clearly not where he had fallen originally. His hands gripped tightly to the rubble before him, and an empty water bottle lay on the ground beside him. The back of his head had been badly burned –  _his vanity will take a blow when he realizes he’s missing half his hair_  – and his left leg was bent at a hideous angle. Casting aside his paralysis, Rude checked the area for hazards with a glance and then strode swiftly forward to gingerly roll Rufus over.  
  
“He’s still alive.” Rude said to the other two when a quick check confirmed that Rufus’s airway was open and he was breathing.  
  
“Thank the Planet.” Elena replied, sighing. From the corner of his eye, Rude could see Reno shoving the girl back into action. He could hear his partner castigating her for getting distracted, and forcing her to help him prepare the collapsible backboard they had brought.  
  
“Come on!” Reno –  _the cheerful son of a bitch_  – was saying. “Pull yourself together! What kind of Turk are you? We’re on duty today, and we’ve got a job to do!”  
  
Although the president’s left knee had swollen to a distinctly unnatural size, his arms seemed relatively unharmed. A line of blood trickled down the side of his head from slightly above his left temple. Rude positioned his hands carefully, stabilizing Rufus’s head as best he could. Elena positioned the backboard onto the ground beside Rufus, which was mercifully about even with the ground beneath him.  
  
“Now.” Rude said softly, and together he and Reno carefully rolled Rufus onto his side. Elena quickly slid the backboard beneath him, and then they rolled him back down.  
  
“Rude, you’re so cool!” Reno remarked, a cocky grin lighting his face once more. The smile on Elena’s face briefly eclipsed the continued worry for Rufus’s health. The president may have been badly injured, but at least he was alive, and would probably stay that way. Elena reached down and gently brushed away the locks of hair from Rufus’s face –  _she’s such a mother_  – before she efficiently fastened the C-spine collar around Rufus’s neck while Rude continued to stabilize the injury. Reno had quickly fastened the straps that would hold Rufus to the stretcher, and once the collar was on, Rude did likewise to the strap over his forehead.  
  
“Let’s move.” He said, grabbing a hold of the top of the board. Reno carefully seized the lower hand-holds, and together they lifted the board in to the air. Moving as quickly as they dared, the three Turks hurried their president from the scene of his recovery, Elena trying to get a hold of the others from her PHS the whole way.  
  
“What’s that?” Elena asked suddenly as they boarded the helicopter they had stowed in the outskirts of Midgar. She pointed back into the sky, where a large glowing light had begun to descend upon the city.  
  
Rude’s only response was to drag her into the helicopter and take off as quickly as possible.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Aerith knelt amongst the flowers and grass conjured by her own mind to provide the most comforting setting for her work, the pale pink of her dress in sharp contrast to the deep green around her. An all-encompassing calm wrapped around her, freeing her to focus upon the physical world from within the Lifestream. It carried her slowly towards the point of need, the focus of her casting. Since her death, she had known it was only a matter of time, time that now seemed to be running out.  
  
_Soon…_  Her hands clasped tightly before her.   _Please, noble Planet, use me as your vessel. I gave my life to call Holy forward and save my people, the people I have chosen to be my own. Let the ending of my race be the promise of your own, for they will learn in time to care for you as we once did, if you allow them. Please, precious one. Heed me, I pray._  
  
She could feel it beneath her, around her, responding to her call.   _If a soul praying for Holy reaches the Planet…_  It was a fable Aerith had been told since she was a child, since her mother had entrusted to her the last, the most important and most precious tool of the Cetra.  
  
“The Planet cannot use Holy alone, Aeri.” Her mother had said, running a brush through Aerith’s hair before capturing it deftly in her own hands and tying a ribbon around it against the back of her head. Aerith remembered the weight of the small bauble on the ribbon, a little white gem the mean man had called useless. “I don’t think anyone, or anything, can.”  
  
“Why, Mama? Isn’t the Planet strong enough?” She had asked, pulling her half-plaited hair from her mother’s hands as she’d turned to face her mother. “I thought the Planet could do  _anything_ , anything at all!”  
  
Ifalna had laughed then, and Aerith had huffed and turned away, crossing her arms as she pouted. Loving hands had gathered Aerith’s hair, brushing it once more before starting to braid it again. She had sighed, relaxing almost against her will at the pleasant sensation of the touch.  
  
“It isn’t that the Planet isn’t strong enough, Aeri.” Her mother had said as she finished the last of the plait and began to tie another ribbon around the end of it. “The Planet has the power to do just about anything it wants to do. The problem is, Aeri, that power alone isn’t enough to summon Holy.”  
  
“Why not?” She had replied, waiting until the ribbon was secure before facing her mother again.  
  
“Because.” Her mother had answered with a grin and a wink. Then she had paused, seeing Aerith’s expression, and said more seriously, “Some things, Aeri – not everything, but some things – some things depend on more than just power. Even the strongest of all powers can be bent, can be bowed. The greatest power anyone has ever had isn’t a power at all, but a feeling. The Planet has strength, many strengths, but emotion and connection to those living on it is not among them. Holy, Aeri, needs that strong emotion to become active. If a soul using that strong emotion reaches the Planet, the Planet will respond and provide the physical power necessary to use Holy. So you see, dearling, neither the Planet nor a person can use Holy alone. Promise me you’ll remember?”  
  
“So the Planet works with the person, and the person has to work with the Planet?” Aerith had asked then, eyes wide.  
  
“Exactly.” Her mother had replied, brushing Aerith’s bangs from her face before leaning down to kiss her forehead. “Now, it’s past your bedtime, so you’d best get some sleep.”  
  
“Yes, Momma.” Aerith said, lying down on the pallet on the right side of the cell. Her mother walked over to the door and knocked twice, waiting patiently until the guard came over and opened it. Aerith had drifted off to sleep as Hojo appeared to lead her mother off to more experiments.  
  
_I remember, Momma._  Wisps of green mist danced around her, called by the strength of her desire.   _For my friends… For Cloud… For Marlene, and the other children… For everyone…_  
  
The white glow of Holy mixed and mingled with the green of the Lifestream around her, and suddenly Aerith could see everything. Ants crawled along the ground, wolves roamed the planes, fish swam in the depths of the sea – people laughed, and cried, and feared. Behind it all, headed straight for her former home, was the glowing, ominous presence of Meteor. The white light of Holy sprang from her, covering the city in a blanket of light attempting to repel the intruder. The mindless, empty child of hatred bore down upon Aerith. Her feelings, her love were strong, but even she knew that her strength could not last under the continued attack.    
  
_I’m not strong enough, not alone. Help me, help us! Please…!_  
  
The green glow of the Lifestream surged forward then, heading straight for Midgar, but Aerith knew in an instant of sharp clarity that she wouldn’t be able to wait for the help. Her strength had already been stretched to its limit, had begun to bend, and headed towards the inevitable moment when it broke.  
  
_Sorry, I’m so sorry._  Her anguish increased the urgency of her call to the Planet, and Holy flared brighter for a moment as the Lifestream rushed to join it. The flare faded, though, leaving the bright white light weaker then it had been and fading by the moment.  
  
_I’m so sorry. I couldn’t –_  
  
A hand landed on her shoulder, resting there steadfastly, and Aerith gasped as her energy suddenly increased. Smiling, she drew on the new reserves that she could tell would be enough. The green rush of Lifestream drew closer and closer until it washed over her as a cool, soothing balm.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Darkness surrounded him. The air was thick and heavy with it, weighing oppressively upon him. His body felt limp, denying his best efforts to move, and so Cloud contented himself to merely drifting, drifting in the emptiness around him. The memory of fighting Sephiroth shone sharply in his mind, and Cloud could not deny his satisfaction with the victory.  
  
_But Meteor was still falling… We were on the Highwind, watching it hit Midgar, and Holy was there, but it was weak… Did it fail? Is this what being dead feels like? It’s really not so bad…_  
  
The darkness was warm, and it carried him gently towards a glow he hadn’t noticed at first. It glimmered bright green, twinkling against the blackness all around. Slowly, slowly it drew nearer, and Cloud could see a figure outlined against the splash of colour. She reached a hand towards him, and Cloud’s suddenly functional arm returned the grasp and allowed himself to be pulled into the light.  
  
_Aerith…_  
  
“Hello, Cloud.” She said, and her smile shone as radiantly as the light around her. “How have you been?”  
  
“Aerith, I…” He began.   _This is impossible. I know she’s dead… am I? I guess I must be… How do I tell her? How can I explain that her sacrifice has gone to waste, that Midgar –_  
  
“Awww, Cloud!” Cloud was pulled from his distracted thoughts as she reached out and grabbed his face, turning it towards her. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten me! I’ll be very upset if you have!”  
  
She was grinning at him again, eyes lit up impishly as his arms acted of their own volition and drew her into a tight embrace. She responded in kind, wrapping her arms around him and leaning her head against his chest.  
  
“So you do remember.” She said.   _She’s so solid, so real…_  Aerith remained motionless in his arms, and he savoured the sensation of touch. “Good.”  
  
“Aerith, I… I…” Cloud stammered, drawing back so he could look at her.  
  
“Geez, Cloud, does everything have to be about you? You… you… what?” She replied. Her smile was softer then, and something close to sorrow glimmered in her eyes. “You don’t have to worry any more. Holy came, and the Planet is safe. Everything will be fine, you’ll see!”  
  
“But Meteor…!”  
  
Aerith shook her head, the long braid swaying visibly behind her.  
  
“No buts!” She replied firmly, thumping him square in the chest with one of her hands and pulling back. “After all, Turks only scout the best for Soldier, and you  _know_  that as one of the best I clearly can tell whether or not there’s something to worry about. So, since I’m  _telling_  you that there’s nothing to worry about, everything must be all right!”  
  
_Aerith…_  His heart ached at the sight of her, standing surrounded by a field of flowers now, as independent and playful as she had been the first time he met her.   _“Will you be my bodyguard?”_  Her request flashed across his mind, and then Reno chasing after them.   _“Why is he after you?” “I don’t know!” “Turks scout for new Soldier candidates, and take care of things like kidnappings and assassinations.” “I can’t think of why anyone would want to kidnap me, so they must want me for Soldier!” “We’re going on a date!” “What?” “Come on!” Being pulled swiftly into the Gold Saucer’s Enchantment Evening… A long sword swinging slowly down towards her, but being frozen and unable to act._  She stood before him now, grinning and waiting impatiently for his response, and he reached out to seize her hands in his.  
  
“Aerith, I’m so sorry!” The words burst forth from Cloud as the images of the past played across his mind. Staring into her wide, bewildered eyes, Cloud found suddenly that he couldn’t abide looking at her –  _don’t deserve to see her, don’t deserve her forgiveness_  – and glanced away.  
  
“Hey, it’s all right!” Aerith replied, no sign of hatred or sorrow in her gentle voice. “I know it’s almost time for you to go back to the others now. Don’t worry, though! You’ll see me again!”  
  
“What?” He answered, head jerking back towards her. She stood among the yellow irises, looking healthy as ever, and for a moment he could have sworn she meant that she wasn’t dead after all.  
  
“It seems that after everything you did to defeat Sephiroth, and the number of times you’ve nearly drowned in the Lifestream, the Planet’s decided that She likes you.” Aerith huffed, pouting at him. “But don’t go thinking She wants to date you or anything. The Planet and I made a deal – you’ll protect both of us, and  _I’ll_  be your date.”  
  
Cloud blushed a dark crimson and shook his head. “Aerith…”  
  
“Stop saying my name like that! It’s too sad.” She smiled at him, and the white light swelled around her again, blocking the flowers from his view. “It’s time.”  
  
“Time for what?” He asked bewilderedly. He got no response, though, as the glow washed over him, blinding him. Aerith’s smile was the last thing he saw before the world disappeared in the brilliant blaze of light.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“WOAH!” Zack exclaimed as the waves rocked the small boat to and fro, jarring him awake. The trip had been long and tedious, but they were finally nearing the Northern Continent. The ex-Soldier jumped to his feet and looked towards the source of the blast force. The glare of a brilliant light shot across the water from the direction of Midgar. Zack stared straight into it, ignoring the pain of the brightness.  
  
“What the hell is going on?” shouted the pilot of the ship from below deck. Zack gazed into the over-bright glow, red and white mixing around the Eastern Continent in an incomprehensible pattern.   _Midgar… The lights are over Midgar._  He glanced quickly overhead.   _Oh, Planet, the information was wrong and Midgar’s paying for my mistake!_  The Mako in the air was tangible, flowing past him and headed for the brilliant glow.  
  
“Turn around!” He shouted, watching the colors mixing. The red spread across the layer of white like blood on snow, seeping through in pockets.   _Is that… Holy?_  Zack watched in growing horror as the red gained strength, pushing deeper into the white. The white flickered slightly, caving a bit, and then –   
  
_What in Hades…? Lifestream?!_  
  
Mako green joined together with the brilliant white light, empowering it to repulse the red attack of Meteor. More Mako streamed into the city, strengthening the light until even Zack’s enhanced eyes could not handle the strain and he was forced to look away.  
  
“What’s going on?” The boat owner’s voice was nearer now, possibly at the cabin door. When the light faded, Zack spun around to face her, hurrying her back to the controls. “What happened?”  
  
“We need to get back to Midgar, now!” The Soldier replied, feeling the shift of the boat’s direction upon the water as she altered the controls. “The information I received was wrong. It looks like Meteor just hit Midgar.”  
  
“It  ** _what?_** ” the woman asked, aghast. She turned to stare at him until he shooed her back to the controls. “How are we still here?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Zack replied honestly, shaking his head as he squinted at the horizon. The retreating Mako again saturated the air, Lifestream flowing back towards wherever it had come from now that the danger had passed. Fortunately, the city was close enough that it would be mere hours before they arrived. He continued, “But I can’t take the chance that Cloud’s still here, too, and still intent on destroying the world.”  
  
The woman looked at him incredulously – he could feel it even though he couldn’t see it.  
  
“Okay…” she said, disbelief strong in her voice. Nevertheless, the boat began to head unerringly for the nearest shore, and whatever arrival there might bring.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“Cloud!” Tifa shouted, running over to him as the brilliant light of what must have been Holy faded slowly away. The blond ex-Soldier lay motionless on the deck, his eyes closed. She fell to her knees beside him, resting her hand upon his forehead as she checked his pulse.  
  
“Shit.” She cursed, hastily pulling her gloves off and trying again.   _Oh, thank the Planet._  To her relief, it still beat soundly beneath her fingers. Cloud’s head felt warm, but not overly so. Tifa used the pad of her thumbs to gently lift his eyelids. Though his pupils were slightly dilated, nothing seemed to be too wrong with him.  
  
“Yo,” Barrett said, coming up beside her, “he all right?”  
  
“Mm.” She nodded affirmatively.   _How am I supposed to know, hmm? Do I look like a doctor?_  She lifted her head and looked up at him. “I think so, but we should probably get him to a doctor soon. What happened?”  
  
“Holy,” Nanaki replied. The soft sound of his paws padding across the floor echoed as he approached the window. Staring towards Midgar, he continued, “It’s just like Grandpa always said it would be. A brilliant white light, shining against the darkness, that glows green as it becomes effective. I wonder if he knew that the green came from the Lifestream…?”  
  
“Wait, wait – hold on!” Yuffie interrupted, bounding forward from her place on the bridge.   _She looks almost as green as the Lifestream herself… I’m so happy I don’t get motion sickness…_ The ninja leaned over the railing towards the glass at the front of the window, then turned away as her face became a still deeper shade of green. “So Meteor is gone now? It’s all really over?”  
  
“It’s because of Aerith.” Tifa said, now cradling Cloud’s head in her lap. She ran a hand carelessly through his wild hair, gently stroking it. “What else could it have been? Her prayer must have reached the Planet, just like Cloud said it would. Aerith saved us.”  
  
“But she’s dead!” Barrett protested, waving his arm about in the air.   _No, you think? Oh, Barrett, I wish you would realize that not everything in the world has to make sense… Sometimes things simply are…_  
  
“It was her.” Tifa repeated, firmer and with more confidence.   _A pretty girl in a red dress, grabbing her hands over the body of the creeps they had knocked out. “Come on, we’ve gotta help Cloud!” The same girl in pink, kneeling in prayer, smiling at them as a sword descended through her from above…_  Tifa shook her head and looked up at her partners. “I bet she just had a long way to go to get to the Planet. It can’t have been an easy trip, but she did it. Don’t ever doubt it!”  
  
_Can’t let them see… have to be strong…_  Tifa turn her head down, staring at Cloud again and letting her hair shield her face from view as tears welled up in her eyes. With loving care, she brushed the stray locks of hair away from his face, focusing on him as a way to distract herself from her missing friend.  
  
“Well, obviously! Who else could it have been aside from Aerith?” Yuffie’s voice contained a strange texture to it, and for a moment Tifa thought the girl might have been as upset as she herself felt. She changed her mind, however, when the younger girl continued, “After all, no one could use Materia like Aerith could! She must have spent time in Wutai when she was younger to learn her skills.”  
  
“Hmph.” Cid grunted.   _What the…?_  Tifa glanced up as the world began to tilt forward. She turned to their pilot, noticing that the others had done so as well. “I don’t know anything about that damn Holy or any of that shit, but I do know that if we don’t get the Highwind on the ground soon, it’ll run out of fuel.”  
  
“Oh, no!” The ninja exclaimed, throwing her hands into the air in exasperation. “Are we at least near a town? I don’t want to have to drag Mr. Spiky-Haired-But-Can’t-Stay-Conscious along with us if we’re going far.”  
  
“You won’t have to.” Vincent said from his usual spot near the monitors. “Compared to other burdens, I’m sure Cloud will be light.”  
  
_I wonder what he means, other burdens… Maybe something to do with the sin that he never talks ab- ?_  
  
The plane landed with a jolt on the field, tearing Tifa from her thoughts. As she glanced through the front glass of the Highwind, the welcoming lights of Kalm town were clearly visible. It rolled slowly along the grassy plain, coming to a halt just outside the town proper.  
  
“Great job, sir! A perfect landing!” chorused the crewmen. Cid grinned proudly, tossing the end of his scarf over his shoulder.   _He really loves to be the center of attention, doesn’t he?_  Tifa stifled her laughter, turning back to the blond before her. A pair of strong arms, one covered in a bronze claw, reached suddenly under Cloud’s body and lifted him into the air. When Tifa glanced up, Vincent nodded at her, and she smiled in reply.  
  
“All right everyone, let’s go!” She said, rising to her feet and leading the way off the airship and into Kalm.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
_At least,_  Tseng thought wryly as he began counting the ceiling tiles again,  _this room has something for me to do._  
  
It had been two and a half months since Sephiroth had run him through at the Temple of the Ancients. In that time, Tseng had had a splenectomy and had the left lobe of his liver excised. After such invasive surgery, his body had been subjected to a wide host of complications caused by infection. He’d been feverish and incoherent for several weeks, and as such needed to take his time in getting well if he wished to make a full recovery.  
  
Or so they told him.  
  
For his part, Tseng didn’t remember much of the first two weeks he’d been at Junon Military Hospital. Being sedated and delirious will do that, though. On the other hand, he remembered the following two months with painstakingly sharp clarity. Turks as a whole were fanatically loyal to one another. Tseng had encouraged this in them, had developed that vaguely nurturing impulse towards one another, and had used it both to boost morale and protect his people.  
  
None of this would stop him from killing them all if they didn’t stop being so ridiculously overprotective of him.  
  
It had taken them a month to even begin giving him information about the current state of the world. A  _month._  When one is the leader of an intelligence unit, one expects to be kept informed every minute of every day. That a month had gone by… it was unthinkable. Even now, Tseng felt certain that they were keeping things from him.   _And the excuses…!_  
  
“We can’t tell you that, Boss. You’d just get stressed, and raise your blood pressure, and have a relapse.” “Yo, I ain’t gonna tell you, so you can quite asking!” “… … … No.” “Sorry sir, I’m under orders from the acting Turk leader not to discuss those matters with you.”  
  
_That_  particular phrase had grown  _exceedingly_  irritating,  _especially_  when they refused to tell him who the acting leader was. Pity that that sort of thing was decided by committee – or, occasionally, by the President alone.    
  
“Can I get anything for you, sir?” Janice asked, her long silver-gray ponytail swinging behind her as she headed towards the door. The lack of privacy had also grown irritating. Tseng had not been alone at any point, ever. As Janice opened the door, Brick wandered in – proving that no end was in sight,  _and while it’s nice to know I’m appreciated,_  Tseng reflected,  _I wish they would stop treating me like fine Wutaiian crystal._  
  
“An update on the search for Rufus.” He replied sternly, trying to look as threatening as possible while lying in bed. The  _doctors_  had said it should be all right for him to start walking around a bit; his  _subordinates_  had threatened to hurt him if he even tried,  _and right now, I’m just not a match for them.  
  
Stupid stab wound._  
  
“I’ll do my best to find out,” she replied, slipping carefully from the room.   _Well worded – she guaranteed she’d discover the information without promising to tell me… Clearly, I need to scale back on teaching advanced diplomatic techniques early in training._  Running a hand through his short brown hair, Brick seated himself in the chair they’d been keeping in what served as Tseng’s bedroom. Best guess suggested they were still in Junon, but they had been careful to sedate him during the time of the trip from the hospital. This was ostensibly done to prevent him from experiencing any discomfort –  _though it’ll be a cold day in Hades before I’ll believe that_  – and Tseng consequently couldn’t be sure where he was.  
  
“How are you feeling today, sir?” Brick asked gruffly, studying him with a critical eye.  
  
_Even if I tell you I feel fine, you’re not letting me get out of bed, so what does it matter? This is… pathetic._  Tseng stared expressionlessly at him for a moment before resuming his count of the ceiling tiles.   _Fifty one, fifty two, fifty three…_  
  
“Don’t worry about the President, sir.” Brick continued, staring at a point somewhere on the far wall. “Reno, Rude, and Elena are out looking for him. I’m sure they’ll find him. Besides, he’s too stubborn to die.”  
  
Tseng raised an eyebrow at the naïve assurance before continuing in his new hobby.   _I’d even try to decipher one of Reno’s illegible reports if it meant I got information. Even a novel would be great, if only for the distraction!_ He noted idly that there were still one-hundred and forty four tiles on the ceiling, a perfect twelve by twelve pattern.  
  
“Sir!” Janice exclaimed, hurriedly pushing the door open and entering. She closed it behind her before looking at him, her deep brown eyes wide with excitement and a smile dancing on her lips. “They’ve found the President! He’s alive, and they’re taking him to Junon Hospital to recover. Meteor has also been stopped, though no one seems to know how it happened. Initial reports mention a bright green and white glow.”  
  
_Holy…? So Aerith_ did _succeed…_  
  
“Well then,” Tseng said, pushing himself gingerly into a sitting position, ignoring the instant protests of his Turks and the stabbing ache in his side, “we’d better get back to Junon Hospital quickly.”  
  
“Sir, please, you need your rest! If you move too much you could aggravate the injury, or tear the stitches -”  
  
“C’mon, Tseng, you  _know_  how much trouble we’ll be in if we bring you back there!”  
  
“I  _said_ ,” Tseng repeated, glaring at the two of them, “we’d better get back to Junon Hospital.”  
  
“… Yes, sir.”  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“How’s the kid?” Barrett asked as Vincent wandered back down the stairs. The dark-haired man said nothing in reply, a fact which made complete sense when the kid followed him back down the stairs.   _Damn, he’s tough. Hard to kill, ain’t he?_ The blond glared at him for his thoughtful concern, and Barrett glared right back at him.    
  
The lobby of their hotel in Kalm was crowded with the different members of their traveling band, all waiting to find out what had happened. Barrett had been to see Marlene,  _my little angel – I’ll take care of her, Dyne,_  and had just gotten back to hear that there was still no word. The large man had settled down on a stool, drinking a zolom Tifa had made for him, to wait with the rest of them for news.   _A little alcohol sure helps after a long day,_  he had thought as the drink slid down his throat.  
  
“Geez, Barrett, you almost sounded like you were worried about Cloud for a second there!” Yuffie said, throwing her elbow into his ribs with more force than was necessary as Cloud came over to stand by their table. Yuffie leaned against Barrett for a moment before sitting up and continuing to nurse her current drink as she continued, “Better be careful or people will start to mistake you for someone who cares!”  
  
The ninja was more than a little drunk at the moment, having consumed at least three Horny Hades that he had seen, and who knew how many before that,  _but when ya spent the day saving the fuckin’ world, ya deserved a fuckin’ drink._  Tifa poured Cloud a flaming cactuar, which the kid gulped down.   _Fuckin’ Sephiroth, man, he defeated fuckin’ Sephiroth! That’s fuckin’ unbelievable!_  Tifa poured him another, but he shook her off and rose to his feet.  
  
“Where are you going, Cloud?” Tifa – who, it should be added, was the only sober one in the group aside from Vincent – asked.   _Cloud, Cloud, Cloud – it’s always about that kid with her, isn’t it?_  The kid didn’t bother answering, just headed out the door. “Cloud!” Tifa called after him. “Hey, Cloud!”  
  
“Leave ‘im ‘lone.” Barrett said, draining the last of his own drink dry. Cid nodded in agreement and pulled a fresh cigarette from its pack as he put the last one out in the ash tray. The robot thing’s lights were out, but the giant feline and the vampire seemed to agree. The ninja didn’t say a word, just held out her drink for more.  
  
“Someone should be making sure he doesn’t get hurt out there, or collapse again!” Tifa said, biting her lower lip.  
  
Cid, Vincent, and Barrett exchanged glances. The pilot was too drunk to go; he had had even more to drink than Yuffie had.   _Aw, fuck, man, c’mon, you know we don’t get along…_  But Vincent’s eyes seemed to say that he’d earned a break after keeping the dark-haired girl away from their mighty leader while he was sleeping.   _All right, all right, already…_  
  
“Don’t worry, Teef.” Barrett replied, checking to make sure his gun was loaded before getting to his feet and heading out the door.   _Fuckin’ great, just fuckin’ great. I’m baby-sitting for the fuckin’ saviour of the world._  He pulled it open and headed out into the street, calling, “Hey Cloud, wait up!”  
  
The blond man didn’t seem to be listening, heading intently out of town. Where exactly he was going, Barrett didn’t have any clue,  _but Teef’ll kill me if I let him go off alone._  Barrett picked up his pace, running after the still strolling ex-Soldier.  
  
It was a beautiful evening in Kalm. With Meteor’s destruction, the sky had gone back to the way it always had been – crystal clear and completely open, a sky completely different from the one Barrett had known in Midgar, blocked by the Plate and a cloud of perpetual smog.   _If we had been there, if_ Marlene _had been there…_  The glaring absence of the towering Plate stared at him from the western horizon, and he resisted thinking about the lives lost to Diamond Weapon and Meteor.  
  
“Ow!” Barrett shouted as he ran straight into Cloud, bouncing off the solid man and falling flat on his ass. “What the hell, man?”  
  
Cloud didn’t answer, though.   _Fuckin’ kid... Not even gonna help me up, is he?_  He stood frozen as Barrett got to his feet and dusted himself off, muttering the whole while. Once the dust was off as best it could be, Barrett finally realized that there was something wrong with such unnatural stillness.  
  
“Cloud?” he repeated. When the blond didn’t answer, Barrett followed his gaze. Across the field, standing as frozenly as the ex-Soldier himself, stood another spiky haired man, staring intently at Cloud.  
  
“Zack…” the kid whispered.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“I’m sorry,” the boat’s owner said apologetically to Zack as she released him on the shores near Kalm. The wreckage floating in the water near Midgar had proved too treacherous for her to navigate, and she had consequently floated the boat to the next closest shore area.  
  
“Don’t worry about it,” Zack replied, smiling at her. He jumped off the boat and walked onto shore, turning back to give her a quick wink. “Thanks for the ride.”  
  
“Good luck!” she called, pulling the boat back from the shallows and motoring carefully back through the canal.    
  
Zack watched her go briefly before heading up into the town. Midgar seemed to still be standing, for the most part –  _What the hell happened to the Plate?_  Where once a steel tribute to the dominance of Shinra tower had stood, a giant towering over the bustling metropolis, now only a single steel support bar remained.   _Did Meteor… Cloud, Cloud, how could you?_ The vacant horizon stared at Zack, a condemnation of all he had failed to do.  
  
The moon’s pale light was the only thing guiding his way now, now that Meteor was gone. Mako enhanced vision meant that it wasn’t a problem in terms of continuing on his way,  _but I need to be at full strength before I face him. He won’t give me any quarter... After all, I taught him to take on enemies with his full strength, didn’t I?_  A bitter chuckle escaped Zack’s throat, forcing its way past his lips. With a sigh, he turned to head into Kalm and catch a good night’s rest –  _sleep in a real bed, see if anyone’s selling high level material, maybe get more infor –  
  
Cloud._  
  
Zack froze, dazed by the sight of the very last person he had expected to see.  
  
The blond haired man looked so very much the same, and yet so very different. His spiky blond locks stood up at all angles –  _What’s up, Chocobo Head?_  – gathered in an unruly and barely combed mass. He was still short –  _Need a boost?_ – and didn’t look to have gotten any taller at all. The shape of his face, even his sword –  _I don’t think a little thing like you is suited for a big weapon like mine_  – was achingly familiar.  
  
The clothes were different, though –  _I’m going to make Soldier, just you wait!_  – they reminded Zack of his own. The weapon, however much he had loved it, still looked out of place on the younger man. The most striking difference, though –  _Do they glow in the dark? I always wondered…_  - was his eyes. The Mako in them stood out brightly in a way Zack had only ever seen on Sephiroth’s face, unnatural luminescence shining from cornflower blue eyes.  
  
“Cloud…” The word escaped, more breathed than said.   _Oh, fuck, fuck… what do I do now?_  
  
The former trooper looked as dumbstruck as he felt, completely pole-axed, and for one beautiful, terrible moment Zack could almost believe that everything could go back to the way it had been before Hojo had gotten his hands on them, that they could have the tearful happy reunion that movies always promised.   _Don’t worry about it, Cloud! We’ll go to Midgar and be mercenaries together, and everything will be fine!_  The unfulfilled promise, the promise he had made but been kept from keeping.  
  
“Zack…” Anything less than Mako-enhanced hearing would never have caught the whisper from as far away as they currently stood.   _Oh, Cloud, what am I going to do with you?_  It drifted between them, hanging in the suddenly deep silence that surrounded them.   _I’ll make this right Cloud, I promise! It’ll be all right!_  The blond’s Mako-clouded eyes stared through him, wide and vacant, and Zack could feel his last hopes of Cloud’s sanity drift away. Unbidden, his earlier convictions rose to the front of Zack’s mind.  
  
_Promise… if I… like Sephiroth…_  
  
A glint of light reflected into Zack’s eyes, and he looked in the direction from which it had come. The remains of Shinra tower condemned him for his inaction.   _Zack… if I… like Sephiroth…_  From the edges of memory, pale blue eyes stared at him as the last edges of sunlight faded away, and Zack knew that he could wait no longer.    
  
_Promise!_  
  
Unsheathing his sword as he went, Zack charged without hesitation at the stolen body that had once housed his best friend’s soul.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Every silver lining has a cloud.” ~ Mary Kay Ash

When Cloud had left the inn, he hadn’t really known where he was going. He had left most of his stuff behind him, so he would probably return sooner or later. His sword, though – that, Cloud had carried with him. Not only was heading out of town alone dangerous, but the blond found he couldn’t remember the last time he’d gone anywhere without its comforting presence by his side.   _Not that I remember much of anything, anyway…_  
  
“Hey Cloud, wait up!”  
  
The shout that echoed behind him didn’t come as a surprise. Tifa had been… worried about him. He knew that, even if he didn’t understand it, but that didn’t change the fact that company was the last thing he needed. He stalked from the town with greater speed, hoping Barrett would take the hint.   _Of all the morons in the world…_  Unfortunately, Cloud’s luck continued its six-year dry streak, and the older man followed him.  
  
Kalm lived up to its name, the stillness of dusk settling around a peaceful city.   _I wonder how close I’ll have to get to Midgar before I find a monster or two to fight._  The last rays of the sun’s light shone on the remains of Shinra Tower, visible despite the distance. The onslaught of night would not change Cloud’s hastily made plans to find something to let off a little tension on. His enhanced eyesight combined with the bright crescent moon hanging low overhead to keep the plains illuminated even as the daylight faded. He paused for a moment there, staring at the visible signs of Shinra’s collapse.  
  
“Ow! What the hell, man?” Cloud had felt something bounce off him the moment before Barrett spoke, and the blond found himself almost inclined to snicker at him. Cloud glimpsed a figure circling towards the entrance to Kalm. He would have ignored it, except –   
  
“Cloud.”  
  
The word reached his ears softly on the night breeze, but it froze him as much as an arctic chill could have.   _Impossible. It couldn’t be him, he’s dead._  The blond man turned to face the figure directly.   _Oh, Planet. It – but he – how…?_  
  
“Cloud?” His name was louder then, came from behind him.   _Zack's dead, isn't he? Isn’t he dead? I saw him die, saw him save me._  Cloud blinked a few times, trying to clear the impossible vision from his line of sight. It remained, though, as stubborn as the person it represented. He stared unabashed at the long dark hair and warm blue eyes, exactly as he remembered them.  
  
“Zack.” The word slipped unintended from his lips, scarcely breathed into existence, but the figure staring at him from across the plains heard it nonetheless.   _Mako improves the senses, kid. You’ll see what I mean._  The man in question nodded once, more to himself than to Cloud. The blond had only a moment to wonder what that meant before Zack came charging at him.  
  
_No. Not again. Please, Planet, don’t make me kill a friend again…_  
  
Cloud had no time to fight with his options when self-preservation kicked in and he drew his sword to parry the blow that would otherwise have cleaved him in two.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Barrett considered himself to be many things. He was a crusader, an environmentalist, and a protector of the planet. He knew how to run a bar, how to drink everything in it, and even how to be a father on occasions. He had never, however, been an expert on swordsmanship.  
  
_Shit._  
  
That was the only word for it, really, when the spiky-haired punk he’d grudgingly agreed to follow suddenly wound up in battle with someone who moved like Sephiroth had. Barrett stayed just long enough to watch the first clash of their swords. They were barely a minute out of town, and the best option available to him at the moment was getting the others out there and hoping the kid could hold on that long. He watched as the dark-haired intruder spun around Cloud after the initial clash, aiming his next strike at the kid’s back. The blond swung his own sword over his shoulder, protecting his back in response to the other blade even as he swung around to face his attacker once more.  
  
_Some fuckin’ break this turned out to be…_ Barrett turned and sprinted back to the hotel as quickly as his legs would carry him, hoping it would be enough.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Blood sang in Zack’s body, the pulsing beat of his heart echoing in his ears as he rushed into the conflict. He ran full-tilt towards his one-time friend, wondering for a moment if the other would even draw his sword before Zack’s first blow ended the conflict. The blond’s large buster sword came free of its sheath, though, easily thwarting the initial attack.  
  
Zack spun right, applying pressure to Cloud’s weapon as he did so. Cloud’s neutral stance should have let him shift with the spin and get a blow on Zack during the time it took the dark-haired man to turn, but the force acted as he’d intended it to and prevented that reaction from Cloud. Quickly, Zack let his momentum flow down his arms, bringing the heavy sword around once again to launch the flat of the blade into the other man’s back.  
  
The sharp sound of metal scraping against metal promptly filled his ears. Zack noticed with some astonishment that Cloud had gotten his sword behind himself in time to deflect the blow. Instead of falling to the ground incapacitated, the blond spun towards him, shifting his grip on his sword. Zack quickly raised his own blade over his head, bracing for the coming blow.  
  
_Well,_  someone  _has been practicing…_  
  
The force Cloud exerted in that blow was stronger than Zack had anticipated, and his own blade came dangerously close to scarring his face before Zack managed to recover and push back. They stood there for a moment, less than a meter apart, swords locked in combat, before both men backed off and jumped back.  
  
“Zack…” Cloud repeated, and his voice was stronger now. His eyes shone in the early twilight, bright from both the Mako and some emotion that the former Soldier 1st couldn’t quite name. “Please… don’t.”  
  
“Don’t what?” He asked, forcing his own expression into impassivity as he readjusted his grip on his buster sword.  
  
“Please don’t force me to kill you, too!” The words ripped from the blond’s throat, his fair blue eyes impassioned and pleading.   _Too, Chocobo Head? Who else? How many?_  Zack tried to keep his face neutral, but Cloud’s reaction showed that he’d undeniably failed. Cloud’s features covered themselves in ice, then, and the blond drew his sword back before charging the older man. Zack leapt into the air, spinning and twisting out of the way to land behind Cloud, who reversed direction with plenty of time to block Zack’s cross-cutting stroke. They both leaned into the crossed blades, faces coming within inches of each other. Zack could read the motion telegraphed by Cloud’s shoulders and responded, the two of them springing back at precisely the same second.  
  
The fight was on.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“How is he?” Elena looked up sharply at the sound of his voice, turning to stare.   _It couldn’t be –_  
  
But it was. There, in the doorway to the private waiting room Junon Hospital had offered to let her and the boys use, stood Tseng. He remained solidly on his feet, dressed in the elegant three piece suit that comprised their uniform. His hair had once more been tied back in a top knot away from his face, a face which to her sharp eyes revealed only the vaguest hints of pain. Behind him, looking sheepish and apologetic, Brick and Janice waited.  
  
_I can’t believe he came…_  The past three hours had been some of the longest in Elena’s life. Once they had found Rufus, it had quickly become obvious that he desperately needed medical attention. That he had survived long enough for them to locate him had been a miracle. Not even the doctors had an explanation as to how he’d managed it, aside from that damned Shinra luck that seemed to see the family through every challenge that came along. Even now, they weren’t sure Rufus would survive.  
  
_He’s really here._  
  
“Well?” Tseng asked, stepping into the room. He moved more slowly than usual, she noticed. His expression was stern as he turned towards his Turks. Elena felt her knees shake as Tseng fixed each of them with a glare. Time in a hospital bed had not diminished his commanding presence in the slightest. When no one answered, Tseng’s voice rang with a more disapproving tone as he continued, “How is President Shinra?”  
  
_He’s going to be all right._  Relief swept through her. Elena knew from Tseng’s expression that he wanted an answer right that moment, but for the life of her, she couldn’t find the breath to give it to him. The image of Tseng, lying motionless on the ground with blood slowly pooling beneath him, was still too fresh in her mind. Standing before them, healthy and whole, Tseng looked like something straight out of a daydream.  
  
“What makes you think we’d know?” Reno replied. His voice was as brash and arrogant as always, but there was a funny little tremor in it that Elena had never heard before. She tore her fascinated eyes away from Tseng to look at her partner. He shrugged and shook his head. “Docs don’t even know yet. He didn’t look too hot, though, boss. What gives, anyway? I thought you were supposed to be resting.”  
  
Reno gave their leader a distinctly sharp look, in response to which Tseng merely raised an eyebrow. The red headed man walked over and threw an arm around his superior’s shoulder, guiding him forcefully to the nearest seat. Elena tried hard to ignore the wince that crossed Tseng’s face as Reno pushed him onto the chair.   _He shouldn’t be up yet…_  Elena turned to glare at her two co-workers, who had defied their orders by letting him come. Brick put a hand behind his head and shrugged. Janice gestured at their leader in a way that screamed  _You know what he’s like!_  Elena sighed and shook her head.   _I do, after all. Men._  
  
“I desired to check on our leader. I trust there is no problem?” Infuriating patience and a raised eyebrow were directed at Reno when Elena turned back towards him and Tseng.  
  
“Actually, sir,” Elena interrupted, coming closer and positioning herself so that Tseng was forced to look up at her, “the acting leader left orders that we should protect you from incurring any further injuries. Too much movement could cause precisely that.”  
  
“Yeah, boss. So you can just sit there and wait until we hear something, got it? Leader’s orders.” Reno grinned at the man and gestured imperiously.  
  
“Irrelevant, Reno. I am ready to resume my duties.” The Wutaiian man’s face remained mostly clear, but a single line of annoyance creased his forehead. Reno’s own face shifted quickly into a carefully neutral expression.   _This is gonna be good._  Elena worked hard to force down a smile.  
  
“Care to make that official, sir?” Reno replied, meeting the older man’s eyes steadily, keeping his gaze from straying to any of the other Turks in the room. “After all, there is protocol to be followed.”  
  
“And since when have you ever cared about protocol, Reno?”   _Challenge._  
  
“How ‘bout since the rules for your temporary replacement had to be called into effect?”  _Accepted. Reno, if you pull this off, I may have to kiss you._  
  
“Fine, then.” Tseng rose to his feet over Elena’s squeak of a protest, but a sharp look from Reno silenced her for the moment.  _You’re going to regret this, Tseng, and I’m glad that you will._  “Pursuant to the Turk Manual, Section VI, Subsection 22, Paragraph 3, I hereby reclaim leadership from you, Reno.”  
  
Elena could feel her smile start. She tried to swallow it, but let it go when she noticed that the others were all showing signs of a similar problem.   _I guess we’re supposed to be happy about this, so long as he isn’t really well yet?_  
  
“Well, sir,” Reno replied, a grin lighting up his face as he forced Tseng to be seated once more, “pursuant to the… whatever, it’s my duty to inform you that you have guessed incorrectly, and as such will be on enforced medical leave for the following week. Now, sit down!”  
  
The man seated himself reluctantly, allowing little traces of pain to cross his disgruntled face as his abdomen folded.  _Sometimes, there are great things about being a Turk._  One of which was undeniably the rules about reclaiming leadership after an injury. Apparently, whoever had written the rules had known how stubborn Turk commanders could be about trying to work when they were hurt, and had made provision such as to prevent them from doing so for as long as possible. Really, Tseng should have known better than to pick the obvious choice.  
  
“What do you think, Rude? Is he violating orders sitting here, or will he be all right if we let him stay?” Reno carefully avoided looking at any of them, tossing his head back and to the side as he usually did. The words may have been directed towards the bald man, but the question was clearly for her. Making sure Tseng’s eyes were elsewhere, Elena blinked at Rude once deliberately, who nodded.  
  
“It’s fine.” Rude replied. Reno looked like he was about to continue speaking, when the door suddenly burst open at the far end of the room.  
  
“How is he?” Elena asked, her heart skipping a beat as the doctor walked into the room.  
  
Tense silence descended while they waited for the prognosis.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“Just you wait! One day, Wutai will conquer all!” Yuffie shouted at the top of her lungs, laughing loudly after her declaration. She swung her glass from side to side, her Horny Hades getting all over the table as she did so. “A toast! To the future glory of Wutai!”  
  
She took a long swallow her drink, ignoring the fact that no one’s glass had met her own, and grinned at the vaguely floaty feeling that spread across her mind. The sweet drink tasted delicious going down.   _I thought alcohol was supposed to be bitter…? Not that I mind…_ Young as she was, Yuffie had never actually gone out drinking before,  _but if this is what it’s like, I wouldn’t mind doing it again!_  
  
The others of their merry band all seemed to be enjoying themselves. Even Little Red Silent Hood had condescended to join them for a drink, with something like a smile dangerously close to appearing on his face. Cloud, of course, was off being Cloud. His absence, however, had yet to stop anyone else (aside from Barrett, of course) from having a good enough time for him, too. Yuffie grinned, looking at the people with whom she had helped defeat the glorious Conqueror of Wutai, and wondered what her father would say when she got home.   _Especially if I…_ borrow _their materia again, that is._ Life did seem to be pretty sweet, all told.  
  
“So, what are we gonna do tomorrow?” The ninja asked, blatantly ignoring the fact that she had interrupted Cid’s speech to Vincent on his own early adventures and piloting prowess.  
  
“Whaddya mean, what’re we gonna do tomorrow?” The pilot asked, turning to her and raising an eyebrow. He took a long drag off his cigarette and stared at her for a moment before continuing, “Tomorrow, we’re gonna worry about what we’re gonna do tomorrow.”  
  
“She’s got a point, though!” Tifa protested, grabbing the drink she’d mixed for herself and coming to sit at the table. The brunette shook her head as she took her first sip, wincing the tiniest bit.   _Guess she needed something strong after today…_ “What do you do the day after you save the world?”  
  
“I do not believe there are precise instructions for this sort of thing.”   _If I didn’t know better, I’d swear he was laughing…_ Vincent fell silent after that remark, though, and aside from Yuffie’s own giggles, an uncomfortable silence settled over the group. No one seemed to actually have an answer to her question, which was annoying, because for once, neither did she.  
  
“Don’t worry, Tifa!” Nanaki said eventually, lifting his head from where it had been resting on his paws. Yuffie watched as the last of a proud race bobbed his head with certainty. “We’ll figure it out!”  
  
“Yeah, somehow…” Tifa replied, nodding back. Her smile might have been more believable then if it hadn’t been so strained at the corners.   _I wonder what –_  
  
Yuffie’s thoughts were cut abruptly short as the door slammed upon and Barrett, panting, charged back into the room. The older girl was beside him in an instant, shaking his arm.  
  
“What happened? Where’s Cloud?” Tifa asked.   _Hades, she’s really got it bad for spiky-hair._  Yuffie giggled, attracting Cid’s attention for a moment, who then just as quickly turned back to the man who had just been tailing their leader.  
  
“Some stupid fuckin’ sonuva bitch attacked us on the Plains.” The old man said, drawing in a huge gulp of air as he gestured for them to follow him. “He’s tough, too. Kid called him Zack, seems like he might be one of Cloud’s old friends, and you  _know_  how well we all get along with them.”  
  
_Sephiroth._  The word echoed in Yuffie’s head, and she found it went pretty well with a beat, and she had just begun wondering if one word could be a song when –  
  
“Esuna!” The healing flow of magic washed through her mind, and suddenly everything seemed much clearer than it had been. Without waiting for Tifa to finish switching her heal material and her fire back so that her all was once again linked to the more useful offensive magic, Yuffie grabbed her throwing star and ran in the direction Barrett had indicated.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“Please don’t force me to kill you, too!” Cloud shouted, staring at the man who had once been his mentor and his best friend.   _Sephiroth… having to kill him was more than enough, and he was just my idol. I can’t kill you, Zack. Not after everything you’ve done for me, I can’t._  He gazed across the field at the man, a man he had believed was gone forever but whom fate had to returned to him only to force him to turn his erroneous beliefs into reality. A silent prayer that he was wrong about the man's purpose here chased unworded across his mind.  
  
The dark blue eyes before him remained unyielding, though. A hint of something ominous began to fill them. Cloud focused on that alien emotion in Zack, on the part of Zack that  _wasn’t_  Zack, just as the Sephiroth he had killed had not been Sephiroth, and readied his sword. Moments later, he was flying across the field, prepared to strike, bringing his sword down heavily, only –  
  
_Damn._  
  
Zack was gone by the time Cloud had reached the spot where the dark haired man once stood. Cloud spun around, blade in front of him to guard against whatever might be coming at him, and was completely unsurprised when a strong force swung down into his raised sword. Cloud leaned into the force, throwing his own weight behind it to challenge Zack’s, before throwing himself back. It was a cheap trick, but maybe Zack would fall…  
  
_Then again, maybe not…_  Zack sprung backwards easily, seeming to have realized what was coming. As Cloud tried to determine the next best move, the glow of Kalm’s streetlights caught the corner of his eyes, and Cloud decided to throw all planning out the window as he started running farther out into the plains. Zack chased after him, drawing close to strike at him. Cloud parried and drew back, running farther. Noticing that Zack was catching up, Cloud took the initiative and went at him, only to be blocked away.    
  
They drew apart once more before being drawn together by the irresistible pull of battle, both striking in the same instant. Their sword crashed off one another with a loud clanging sound. Cloud didn’t pull back this time, instead turning his body around to launch a swinging strike at Zack’s upper torso.  
  
“Why?” The blond asked as Zack ducked, bringing his sword around in a sweeping attack at Cloud’s legs. He jumped over the blade, noticing Zack rolling under his feet as he did so. Cloud flipped in mid-air, twisting to face the opposite direction as Zack got to his feet in a spot that had been behind him moments earlier. Cloud shifted to fall blade first towards the other man, who held out his own broad sword to protect against the momentum of the falling attack. As he balanced and shifted his weight along the blade to flip into the air once more, Cloud continued, “Why are you doing this?”  
  
If the dark-haired man had an answer, he didn’t feel like sharing yet. Cloud landed on ground that should have been behind Zack, turning with his sword raised over his head for protection if the other man went for the attack Cloud would have tried and swung his blade down at him. When Zack did just that, Cloud parried it. The other man spun around, and Cloud found his shoulder aching from the force of Zack’s attack as the man’s blade came across his own.  
  
“I promised you, Cloud.” The Soldier 1st shouted. Cloud, shocked, let his grip relax on his sword for a moment, and Zack used that instant to knock it away from him.  
  
“What?” Cloud asked, springing backwards to stare at the dark-haired man from outside the reach of the other man’s weapon. “You did what?”  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“Helicopter One reporting. Do you read, over?” Katherine said, brushing a wisp of her short blonde hair behind her ear. She held the controls steady as the craft flew swiftly away from the gaping hole in the ground.  
  
“Loud and clear, Helicopter One. What do you have to report, over?” The voice at the end of the transmission was crisp, clean, and more professional than she’d ever expected to hear from its owner.   _She’s really grown up, hasn’t she?_ Katherine nodded to herself in relief.   _About time, too._  
  
“The Northern Crater appears to have been destroyed, for the most part. However, a path still remains by which the depths of it should be accessible. Your orders, over?” Beside her, Katherine watched as Nikolai grinned. At what, she didn’t even want to venture a guess. The former crime boss bodyguard had wanted to go exploring, of course.   _I’m so happy he still hasn’t gotten around to qualifying on the helicopters and isn’t stupid enough to try it without training._  He stared aimlessly out the window, avoiding her side-long gaze.  
  
“Proceed back to base. We’ll send another team out there to examine more in depth soon. For the moment, though – do you think that Sephiroth and Avalanche survived, over?” The woman on the far end returned.   _Why is she concerned about those law-breaking terrorists, anyway? And she still can’t control her inflection properly._  Katherine sighed.  
  
“It’s impossible to be certain one way or the other, but the Highwind is no longer in the vicinity. This suggests that at least one of the two parties involved managed to escape the destruction, over.” She replied.  
  
“Which one…”    
  
“Base, do you read, over?” Katherine asked when the voice faded away. Nikolai was laughing at her, she could see it from the corner of her eye, and it irked her to no end.  
  
“Oh, yes, never mind, over.”   _Oh, Planet…_  The blonde refrained from sighing as she continued on course.  
  
“IS there anything else, over?” She asked, gladly noting that they were almost over the sea now. The rest of the trip back to Junon should be a breeze, now that arctic currents and frost had become less of a danger.  
  
“Yes, actually – just one more thing. He’ll be fine, thanks for asking. Base, over and out.” The final click rang in a way that suggested the radio had been turned off completely, and Katherine could feel her temples throbbing in vexation.   _Does she truly not realize how dangerous turning that off is? What if something happened, what if –_  
  
“Your little sister.” Nikolai said, smiling to himself. After checking that the path ahead was clear, the blonde turned to face him. The dark haired man raised an eyebrow at her before continuing, “She’s cool.”  
  
Only years of training and practice restrained Katherine from screaming in annoyance.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Nanaki shook his head and tapped his tail against the ground as he waited for the others to be ready. Once weapons were hastily assembled, they began a mad dash down the plains to protect their leader from harm.   _He'll be all right, he's Cloud! Right?_  The night was beautiful and clear as Nanaki and the others raced from the inn at Kalm town and towards the obvious signs of battle nearby.    
  
“What do we know about the person he’s fighting?” Tifa asked as they approached the two figures, gearing themselves up for the battle.   _Oh no!_  The battle before them had begun to move across the plains, the two figures running further away from Kalm.   _We’re coming, Cloud. Hang on until we get there!_  Nanaki felt Vincent cast Haste upon them all, and gratefully picked up his pace to catch them. “Any weaknesses, any immunities? Anything at all, Barrett?”  
  
“Teef, you  _know_  I’m no good with Materia, especially Sense!” Barrett shouted at her. It was true, too. Cloud had had to teach him everything, even how to equip it – at least, that’s what Cloud had said once when Barrett was yelling at him for being a spiky haired moron again. A chuckle rolled its way through his body at the thought.  
  
_Wow…_  Ahead of them, Nanaki could see Cloud in the air, balancing his weight using only the force of his blade against that of his opponent. The blond man flipped higher into the air, landing on the opposite side of his opponent, with his sword already poised to block the oncoming blow.   _Cloud’s really amazing. Sure, we all helped to defeat Sephiroth, but Cloud’s the one who really managed it._  The dark haired man launched another attack at their leader, an attack that was once again easily deflected.   _He’s incredible. He –_  
  
Nanaki almost froze as he watched Cloud’s large buster sword slip from his grasp. It spun wildly through the air, sending up a spray of dirt as it dug itself into the ground several yards to the right of the battle. Cloud  _had_  frozen, his entire body rigidly still as he stared at his attacker.  
  
_Cloud…?_  
  
“Shit. Stupid goddamn –“ Cid’s swearing became progressively more creative as they continued their dash.  
  
The two were speaking, that much was clear, but the large red feline could not hear their words even with his own particularly good hearing.   _So none of the others will know…_  Whatever they were talking about, it had Cloud rattled. The blond dove for his sword in a way that completely lacked his usual grace. The other man read the move easily, flipping casually through the air to land directly between Cloud and his sword. He pointed his own weapon threateningly towards the blond.  
  
_Almost there…!_  
  
Nanaki dug his paws into the ground more forcefully, pushing himself ahead of his friends and ever closer to their leader’s weapon. The stranger noticed their approach then.   _He doesn’t seem threatened, though… Does he not realize that we came to protect Cloud, even if that means his destruction?_  
  
The sword was almost within reach. A burst of bright light caught the corner of Nanaki’s eyes, and he turned his head just in time to watch Cloud’s opponent stagger under the impact of what must have been a lightning spell, judging by the accompanying crack of sound.   _Nice one, Cloud!_  Nanaki wrapped his jaws around the hilt of the sword and yanked it free from the ground. He spun quickly about, releasing the weapon at the opportune moment.  
  
“Cloud!” He shouted as soon as the weapon had passed from his lips. The blond’s head snapped towards him, and a dexterous hand snatched the blade from the air, spinning it once before bringing it to bear.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Zack watched as something flashed briefly in Cloud’s eyes, something other than that vague combination of menace and dread that had been directed at him so far.   _Sorry, Cloud._  He brought his sword swiftly into contact with the younger man’s weapon, watching it skitter away.   _I can’t trust you right now, can’t be stopped from stopping you._  Cloud stumbled back a step.  
  
“What?” The blond asked, his voice tight and strained. “You did what?”  
  
“Promised you, Cloud.” Zack replied, stepping closer to the man who had once been his good friend. He tightened his grip on his sword, waiting for a disarming attempt.    
  
That odd something returned to the blond’s eyes. It was hazy, not sharp or direct in the way that most of Zack’s opponent’s thoughts and actions had been.   _He looks… it’s almost like he just woke up..._  Cloud shook his head, tearing his eyes from Zack’s face. He dove uncertainly towards his weapon, but the moment’s hesitation in the move had given Zack more than enough time to beat Cloud to the space separating him from his sword.  
  
“Do you remember, Cloud?” Zack asked, allowing his voice to be kinder than it had been thus far. He smiled, hoping the bitterness of his despair hadn’t slipped onto his face. Zack stood, weapon at the ready, eyeing the blond warily. “Do you remember our promise?”  
  
Cloud stood, silent.   _If he remembers –  
  
What…?_  
  
Zack glanced quickly to his right as a lithe figure crossed the edges of his vision, dashing across the plains. Most monsters would have been driven away by the sounds of battle, but this giant feline didn’t seem to be bothered at all.   _I’ve never seen anything like it!_  He watched for a moment as the creature headed straight for Cloud’s sword, trying to decide if he ought to intercept the beast when –  
  
_SHIT!_  Zack staggered backwards as his body forcibly recalled why he preferred to use Lightning materia rather than having it used on him.   _Stupid of me, should’ve known he’d have materia on him, should’ve remembered he always has some with him –_  
  
“Cloud!” The sword that had been stuck in the ground now headed straight towards them, but that didn’t mean a damn thing.   _It_  talks _! That thing just_  talked _! How in Hades did that –  
  
PLANET FUCKING DAMN!_  Cloud’s weapon was back in the hands of its capable owner once more. Zack watched as the diminutive blond spun the large sword as though it were weightless. He had a momentary glimpse of the other man shifting behind him before a heavy force impacted with the back of his skull and Zack felt the world going dark. He crumpled bonelessly to the ground.  
  
_Planet… fucking… damn…_  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Vincent released the Haste spell he’d been preparing onto Cloud as the man snatched his sword from the air. The short man got control of the weapon and promptly used his extra speed to spin behind his enemy and knock him unconscious. When the man had remained motionless on the ground, and the threat seemed to be gone, Vincent cautiously followed the path of his comrades toward the diminutive blond.  
  
“Zack…” Cloud said softly, his voice fading away as he knelt beside the body.   _Risk is minimal, all should be safe, but…_ Vincent cast a quick glance about the plains to make sure they truly were alone as Tifa moved to stand beside Cloud.  
  
“Zack?” She repeated, her voice filled with surprise. Vincent studied the dark haired man lying before him.   _So this is the man who befriended Cloud and Sephiroth? Whose memories Cloud took for his own?_  The brunette leaned down beside the blond, brushing back locks of hair from the unconscious man’s face so that she could get a better look. “It is him! But… why were you fighting, Cloud?”  
  
_She’s nervous._  Tifa’s hands were slowly clenching and unclenching into fists.  
  
“Zack? Who’s – wait a Planet damn minute, I thought you said he was dead!” Cid said, scowling at the younger man.   _A valid point._  
  
“Yeah!” Yuffie and Barrett shouted, nodding in agreement. Nanaki tilted his head to the side, glancing back and forth between the stranger and the man he followed. The confusion of his friends echoed in his own expression. Vincent remained impassive, clearing his face to allow Cloud the chance to explain.  
  
“I… thought he was.” The blond said eventually, his face slack and vacant.   _Now you don’t know what to believe, do you, Cloud? Oh, Lucrecia…_  The long haired man remembered all too clearly the shock of finding his beloved still alive after all of these years, living a mere half life but still alive and as beautiful as the last time he had seen her. Vincent stepped closer to Cloud, causing his knee to apply gentle pressure to the man’s back.  
  
_It will be explained later. Worry later._  
  
Vincent felt Cloud recover himself, felt the muscles in his back tense as he slipped his arms underneath this… Zack’s body and lifted him easily into the air. The red cloaked man moved back, and Cloud rose to his feet. Tifa joined him instantly.  
  
“Cloud…?” She began.   _Don’t bother him now._  Vincent shifted his weight and bumped softly against the girl as Cloud began to walk back toward Kalm. She stopped speaking and looked at him. Vincent met her eyes unflinchingly, determination in his mien.   _Leave him, for now. Let him overcome the shock first._  Tifa’s gaze searched his own carefully. After a few moments, the brunette found whatever she had been looking for and nodded to herself, turning away to follow Cloud.  
  
As the others all fell back in line, Vincent cast one last quick, surveying glance around the area. With a sigh, he grabbed the two large, sharp objects that had been left lying on the ground before joining the rest.  
  
_So Soldiers_  still  _can’t be bothered pick up after themselves._  His lips quirked into something that might have been called a smile.   _Children._  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
The phone rang precisely three times before he clicked it on.  
  
“Well?” He snapped.   _She’s late, it shouldn’t have taken this long, shouldn’t have had any problems, why is she late?_  He grabbed a pen and prepared to take notes.  
  
“Operations did not proceed as planned.” She replied. “Specimen C defeated Specimen Z without destroying it. Z is likely to survive, and neither C nor Z will likely take action against the other again.”  
  
“It failed?” He slammed his pen down onto the table with more force than was strictly necessary.   _After all this time, all this planning…_ He snarled as he rewrapped his fingers around the pen and began scribbling on the page before him.   _Must finish backup plan, must perfect it, cannot allow it to fail as well…_  
  
“And the other?” Her voice was cool, tranquil.  
  
“Proceeding as planned.” He replied sharply. “You’ll be back soon?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
He hung up the phone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> True story: I drew this fight out with stick figures because I'm terrible at writing action scenes.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this years ago and never posted it to a major site or even really shared it beyond my own blog, at least not that I remember, anyway. In the interest of not having issues with code rot and censorship elsewhere, I'm going to be bringing it over a chapter at a time. Fair warning, it's still not done and I have no ETA on when if ever it will be. Nevertheless, I'm going to try to get back to it as I bring it over so that I can post some new content eventually.


End file.
